November 19, 2004

Good Evening:

On behalf of Africans In America, Inc. I thank the Board and staffs of the Union Square Award Program for this huge recognition and award.

I also want to thank the Executive Director of ECPAT-USA Carol Molensky for nominating us.

When we founded our organization in 2001 to address the issues of human trafficking victims from African living here in New York, very few people knew what we were talking about.

When we introduce ourselves and mention our mission, which is to address the issues of human trafficking especially victims from Africa living in the United States, we get quite a few reactions some of which are the following:

Some dismiss us saying, “slavery!, those people are out of their mind, they don’t have anything better to do”.

Most of the times people thought that we were talking about reparation movement currently going on in the United States .

Some accuse us of ridiculing African culture. Some Africans here in the U.S. even try unsuccessfully, I hope, to erroneously convince others that human trafficking is part of African culture.

We have to educate them that we are talking about new slaves that are coming in from continental Africa today, just like in the 14/15 th century, the only difference is they are not coming in on chains, or on boat this time. And another significant difference is that at this moment, it is not the white man enslaving black people. It is the affluent Africans enslaving the less privileged.

We always have to emphasis that human trafficking is not part of the African culture, rather, it is a practice forced on the people due to economics factors. It has absolutely nothing to do with the beautiful African culture, which we are very proud of.

At that time, there was no organization here in New York with exclusive focus on African victims or that understands many issues they face.

In some parts of Africa today, the leaders still practice ritualistic human sacrifice. African politicians and individuals seeking power and wealth still abduct human beings and slaughter them for ritual purposes. It sounds like the 14 th century, but this is happening today.

In the African nation of Nigeria , we have leaders among them - state governor and other government officials who openly state that they worship in shrines where decomposing human bodies –victims of ritual killing – litter the shrine in the open view. Those victims of ritual killings in most cases are victims of human trafficking. These leaders do visit here in the United States very often and our communities receive them as heroes.

Some of them stay here for weeks and months. One will wonder which shrines they do worship while visiting here in the U.S. and staying that long.

It sounds like 14 th century that in the African nation of Sudan , people are still being chased in the street (villages), captured and taken into slavery in this 21 st century.

Unfortunately, the world governments are not willing to confront the Sudanese leaders.

The United Nations response to the recent genocide in Sudan was to beg the African leaders to find ‘African solution’ to slavery in Sudan . The Africans leaders are currently messaging their Sudanese counterparts to take it easy on the Sudanese slaves.

This is like leaving it to a group of thieves to decide the fate of stolen goods, as well as, decide what should be done to their colleague. We have the feeling they will assist to put the goods away give him (or her) some education on how to be a better thief. I hope you agree with me.

We have the feeling that very soon, African leaders will issue statements that there is no problem in Sudan requiring world intervention. As you all may know, Sudan is oil-rich nation with lots of western interest, so everyone seem to have interest in appeasing the leadership.

We hope that this eloquent award by Union Square Award Program to Africans In America, Inc. will bring more awareness and resource to the victims of human trafficking especially those from Africa living here in the United States .

We promise to put the capital – both the money and fame that comes with this award to good use.

Once again, our gratitude to all of you for making this possible.

Thank you very much.