Journal of Law and Criminal Justice

Trafficking in Persons (Prohibition) Law Enforcement and Administration Act, 2015: An Old Wine in a New Bottle?
Kingsley Osinachi N. Onu, Olatoun A. Kolawole

Abstract
One of the biggest challenges of the 21st Century is human trafficking. Nigeria has been bedeviled by this menace as she is a source, shipment and terminus point for global trafficking in persons. Human trafficking was combatted basically through reliance on the provisions of the Criminal Code Act and the Penal Code Act in Southern and Northern Nigeria respectively, until the year 2003 when a comprehensive legislation on human trafficking prohibition was enacted in Nigeria, and the same was amended in the year 2005. Despite the enactment of this Anti-human trafficking legislation in 2003, the menace of human trafficking has persisted as the law is honoured more in breach than in adherence because of the incoherent nature of the definitions of some offences and the paltry punishments provided therein. The Act did not also capture the offence of organ harvesting and ritual killings that are now prevalent in Nigeria. Because of the above lapses, many good cases could not be established in court. The National Assembly in 2015 repealed the 2003 Act and its Amendment, and in their stead enacted the Trafficking In Persons (Prohibition) Law Enforcement And Administration Act, 2015. This paper seeks to appraise the 2015 Act in a bid to ascertain whether it has covered the lapses of the 2003 Act. This paper finds that the 2015 Act expanded the definition of trafficking in person to include trafficking for organ harvesting or ritual killing that are common in Nigeria today. It also blazed the trail in victim welfare by creating the Victim Trust Fund and Victim Shelter Centre for the rehabilitation, restitution, and reintegration of victims of trafficking into the society. It also afforded immunity from prosecution to victims of trafficking for any offence committed because of being trafficked. However, the 2015 Act like its predecessor (the 2003 Act) is narrow in scope, being that it limited the victims of most of the offences created therein to persons (victims) below the age of 18 years, and as such it failed to capture young adults (like secondary school leavers and tertiary institutions students and unemployed or underemployed graduates) and the aged who are also highly vulnerable to traffickers due to current hash economic state of the country. The phraseology of the 2015 Act in the definition of some key offences like trafficking for use in armed conflicts, movement of persons in and out of Nigeria for trafficking purposes and others are also inchoate and can be evaded by a smart defence lawyer. We, therefore, conclude by saying that although the 2015 Act is innovative, however, it is still bedeviled by similar challenges faced by its predecessor. We, therefore, call for the immediate amendment of the 2015 to cure these anomalies so that the Act can fulfill its purpose.

Full Text: PDF     DOI: 10.15640/jlcj.v8n1a4