Prosecutor laments ‘weak interest’ of victims vs human trafficking
While crusaders against human trafficking are very enthusiastic about pursuing cases and punishing human trafficker, the victims are not, lamented Regional State Prosecutor Virgilio Garcia, during a forum on Social Responses to Human Trafficking, as part of the 18-Day Campaign Against Violence Against Women and Children, initiated by the Ugsad Resource Center of UPV.
Garcia, who also sits as the co-chair of the Regional Inter Agency Council Against Trafficking (RIACAT) said there are cases in Aklan and the most recent in Iloilo province involving about 19 Filipinos victimized in Malaysia.
The local government and the NGOs, including the Department of Justice were enthusiastic in pursuing the case but the victims until now have not filed a case.
Garcia said it could have been a very positive case, with strong pieces of evidence but the victims failed to submit formal documents.
Some agencies can help in preparing documents but the victims have not been cooperating.
“We at the DOJ even promised to exempt them from paying filing fees, and we are still waiting for their move until now,” Garcia said.
Garcia said that this weak response on the part of the victims can be attributed to the fact that most of the illegal recruiters are rich and influential people that the victims will just prove helpless against, or because the “traffickers”and the victims themselves are relatives or close friends of their families.
Dzen Patriarca of the Visayan Forum, a panelist in the forum, said cases against human traffickers do not progress at all for lack of interest on the part of the victims, after they are repatriated or rescued from their places of destination.
OWWA 6 said the agencies involved in human trafficking are blacklisted and the public is always advised to be wary and to be careful, as well as report whenever they sense an element of illegal recruitment in the overseas work transactions or in the manner they are being recruited. (PIA6/ESS).
