/ 6 May 2006

Cameroon appeals for help to combat child slavery

Cameroonian Prime Minister Ephraim Inoni deplored on Friday the exploitation of thousands of child labourers in Cameroon and appealed for further international help in fighting the trade.

Inoni was speaking in response to Thursday’s publication of a report on child labour by the International Labour Organisation (ILO).

He confirmed that ILO projects had helped get 1 600 children off cocoa plantations and out of the cycle of trafficking, but added that ”3 500 more have been identified as victims of these most awful working conditions”.

Inoni promised that the Cameroonian authorities would ”remain active in the struggle against child labour” and called on international partners not to withdraw their support.

The three-year-old ILO project for the elimination of child labour on Cameroonian plantations is struggling to find the funding it needs to continue, according to Alice Ouedraogo, head of the organisation’s Central African operations.

Hitherto financed by the United States, the project must now find a new sponsor.

Child slavery remains a serious problem in West and Central Africa where poor parents sell their children for paltry sums to traffickers who promise to educate them and find them jobs.

United Nations child welfare agency Unicef considers Cameroon to be a major transit country for West African children being smuggled into neighbouring Gabon.

In December the Cameroonian Parliament passed a new law punishing child trafficking with jail sentences and fines of up to 10-million CFA francs ($19 255). ‒ Sapa-AFP