in West Africa
(Photo taken by
Paul Bravender-Coyle during Mission to Africa.
Copyright P Bravender-Coyle).
Society estimates that there are 8,000 girl-slaves —
slaves in the fullest sense of the term — in West
Africa today. These girls are hierodulic slaves,
combining the roles of agricultural slave, domestic
slave, temple slave and sex slave.
offered as human sacrifice to ensure success in war,
these girls are the helpless victims of a traditional
form of slavery which has survived intact since the
pre-colonial era. These slaves live in villages
just a half-day’s journey inland from the very coast
from which slaves were once shipped to the Americas.
from their mothers from the age of four, these girls
work from dawn to dusk in the fields. From the age
of five they are beaten with canes or with
specially-made wire whips. They are raped from as
young as eight years old. Their masters, the
voodoo priests, claim the traditional right of masters
since the dawn of history to free sexual access to the
slaves, and the girls are beaten into submission if they
material in this report is based on a Mission to West
Africa by the Society's Secretary-General.
SOCIETY IN ACTION
Since 1996, the
Society, in discharging its historic role, has purchased
the emancipation or manumission of over 500 of these
slave girls, despite the efforts of the other masters
waging a vigorous campaign against the emancipation of
their slaves, either by refusing to permit their slaves
to be purchased or demanding exorbitant prices for them.
IS THE SOCIETY IN ACTION
more information, read the Society’s
publication entitled The Forgotten Slaves
to pages dealing with slavery in West Africa:
West African slave trade
to other pages dealing hierodulic servitude:
hierodulic servitude in South Asia
to other pages dealing with slavery:
slavery still exist?
slavery in South Asia
on the cocoa plantations in West Africa
to pages dealing with other servile conditions falling
short of slavery:
not responsible for the content of
external internet pages.