The Sunday News
Simba Jemwa, Sunday News Reporter
CHILDREN as young as 12 years are selling themselves for sex for as little as the cost of two kilogrammes of rice in one of the country’s gold mining towns, a Sunday News investigation has found.
Shangani is a small farming and mining settlement near the Shangani River on the road between Gweru and Bulawayo. The town is a hive of activity from two fronts: truckers stopping over night and artisanal gold miners working in the environs of the town.
The investigation by Sunday News was with the assistance of concerned revellers and business owners in Shangani, and it revealed that child prostitution was thriving in the area.
On the dusty back rooms of Shangani we met a group of children aged between 12 and 17 years who were sniffing glue or smoking marijuana and sipping variants of different cough mixtures. Some of these children were involved in prostitution.
Nkosikhona Ncube, who described himself as the street owner, told Sunday News: “They sell their bodies. They go to nightclubs and places they know people sell themselves, but also people come here and take them and pay for sex.”
Glue bottle in hand, 12-year-old Minenhle (not real name) said she did not always feel safe and “bad things” sometimes happened. We were told that for R10 to R30 she would allow men to take her home, into their trucks, or even into the bushes for sex.
Rita, aged 17, told us she became a prostitute aged 13, following in the path of three of her sisters. She said: “I went onto the streets in Shurugwi. I ran away from home and began doing drugs. I sold myself for around R20 or even R10. Sometimes I would even do it for R5.”
A local businessman who asked not be named, told Sunday News: “You’ve got hundreds of truckers travelling through the town along with the illegal gold miners who already work around here and these are people who will exploit that situation. You just have to feel for those children who don’t want to be in that situation. My heart is with those children because I’ve been working with many of them for the last 20 years and I know most of them don’t want to be doing what they are doing.”
Sunday News spoke to a child welfare officer who said: “The vulnerability of this region is enormous, in particular with domestic violence, sexual violence, child labour – which is rife here.
“Due to the high number of drug addicts in particular, which has reached pandemic levels across the country, we know that there are young mothers who offer their children for the drug, for sex.”
Drug addiction
A local police officer who cannot be named for professional reasons told Sunday News: “We still haven’t received any intelligence into men who exploit these youngsters. For example, people exploiting young teenagers sexually in back rooms in the town.”
The officer said they have been trying to take underage sex workers off the streets, but they find them back in the streets in no time.
“When we find these youngsters we sometimes take them in and try and get them back home. But most of them end up right back where it all started: back on the streets. Some of them don’t want to go home even when we offer to help. They knew where they could get business. I picked up one of them 10 times in the same place over a two-year period. The first time when she was 12 years old.”
llegal gold-panners – Image from Shutterstock
Child prostitution is rife in many business centres especially gold mining with a number of children aged between 13 to 17 years dropping out of school due to poverty and peer pressure and join the oldest profession in the world.
According to the United Nations’ Convention on the Rights of the Child, a child is anyone younger than 18 years. – @RealSimbaJemwa
