Slavery is not yet a thing of the past

Aug 24 2007 by Jane Gallagher, Liverpool Daily Post

FIVE years ago, on a press trip to Hong Kong, I was staying at a luxury hotel enjoying a gourmet brunch when I heard the sweetest sound.

Wafting through the windows on the scent of a warm breeze infused with jasmine and incense, came a high-pitched gentle fluttery sound. I was convinced it was a crowd of exotic birds flying past.

But, as I listened, I realised these were human voices. And there was a sadness to their song.

The next thing I knew, our hostess had demanded the windows be shut to drown out the sounds of “those tiresome girls.”

Thirty minutes later, I was outside the hotel which overlooks Hong Kong Harbour and saw exactly where the voices were coming from.

There were literally thousands of young women gathered together in the central square, mostly sat in groups braiding each other’s hair humming and singing softly at the same time.

On closer inspection, I noticed that these were not just young girls on a Gap year, many of them were women in their 30s and 40s. I later learned these women were hundreds of miles from their families who were taking care of their own children while they acted as nannies or housekeepers for the TaiTai (the wives of wealthy men).

Sunday was a rare day off from their minimum wage maximum hour jobs. I thought of my own family back home, and felt an ache in the pit of my stomach for these women who were no different than me except that I had my freedom.

I felt these women were nothing more than glorified slaves.

But I was wrong. With a few exceptions, these women were the lucky ones. They not only got paid, they got to see their families at least once a year.

Unlike Skyra. At the same time, a few thousand miles away in the West African country of Mauritania, Skyra was working herself to exhaustion in the blistering heat, tending animals, fetching water, cooking and cleaning.

The rest of the day and night, she was tied so tight her limbs could barely move.

In Mauritania, slavery had been abolished 20 years earlier in 1981 but with 20% of the 3m population working as slaves, who was going to complain? As you take time to read this paper, spare a thought for the 12m people (6m of them children) worldwide who will never know the luxury of their own time as they endure a life of forced labour.

Across Eastern Europe, girls as young as 11 are being sold into the sex slavery business.

Promised jobs, they are tricked into leaving their homes and countries where they are forced to service up to 30 men a day to survive

And we must also confront the unpalatable reality that slavery is still happening very close to home.

It is not so long ago that the sad story of the Morecambe Bay cocklers came back to haunt Liverpool.

Investigations into the tragedy which cost at least 21 lives revealed the existence of ruthless gang bosses operating right here in our city.

Bonded labour, sweatshops and human trafficking are as much part of the modern-day slavery story as the human cargo which left Liverpool in profit between 1700 and 1807 is part of our history.

Yet there is a glimmer of hope.

Following the 2004 Morecambe Bay tragedy, the Gangmaster Licensing Act was introduced and earlier this month Mauritania’s Parliament took a historic step forward by criminalising slavery.

As Liverpool this week celeb-rates the opening of the new Inter- national Slavery Museum, we must also look to the future and what part we can play in ending this iniquity once and for all.

The museum also includes a learning facility dedicated to murdered Huyton teenager Anthony Walker, and news coverage of the crime to illustrate slavery’s legacy of racism.

Gee Walker says she is grateful that the museum has named one of its learning resources after her murdered son, Anthony: “It’s essential that we learn from the past in order to build a better and more harmonious future,” she said.

And it is essential that, as more and more of us are able to enjoy a better and more luxurious lifestyle with cheaper travel, food and clothes, we realise that somewhere along the line there is a cost. And we must do all we can to ensure that cost is not one of human lives. We must remember slavery is not confined to our past, but a vivid reality in our present.