Children who sell themselves

How much is a child worth?

“Only a few tens of millions. To get a good price, you have to ask a broker, then you can get around a hundred million” - Lu Thi C. said.

6 years ago, C. was not yet 15 years old, in one of the poorest villages, in a poor commune of a poor district in Nghe An province. She told about her trip to China to sell herself in a calm tone: When I left, I was in the 8th grade, my family was so poor, Ms. Mui, a person in the same village, asked me if I wanted to go to China to get married, if I did, she would give me 100 million VND. So I went!

Two young children - victims of human trafficking - were helped by the police to return to their families. Photo: CSCC

A few evenings later, C. followed Ms. Mui to wait for a bus to the city. From there, the 15-year-old girl began her journey deep into the interior of China, with the destination being the house of a widower who was 3.4 times C.'s age. 60,000 yuan was the amount of money that this man spent to buy a new wife. Of that amount, C. only received 100 million VND to send home to her parents, the rest was the broker's share.

Not only C., some Khmu women and girls in some highland villages in Western Nghe An also made similar decisions. Selling themselves, even selling their children when they were just fetuses in the womb… Do you think that is the ultimate in ignorance? No, there is also “hang quay” - referring to women and girls who voluntarily follow human traffickers to marry Chinese men, before leaving, they commit to contact each other for a period of time to organize their escape, then sell them in other areas.

Often, when I meet children who sell themselves and parents who receive money from their children following traffickers, I wonder what led to such a heartbreaking decision? What were they thinking when they received that money? And what can we do to prevent such situations from happening again?

Nghe An Police Department's Criminal Police Department discovered, rescued and returned to their hometowns 3 pregnant women who crossed the border to sell their children abroad, April 2021. Photo: Trong Tuan

July 30th is chosen as the World Day against Trafficking in Persons. In Vietnam, this day is also chosen as the National Day against Trafficking in Persons. Vietnam's efforts and results inanti-human traffickingis undeniable, but re-reading the information that my colleagues and I have researched and reported on the reality of human trafficking, I feel that what has been written, published, and propagated day after day is still not enough. Nghe An is still one of the key localities in the country in terms ofhuman traffickingThe areas that this type of crime often targets are rural and mountainous areas in the districts of Que Phong, Ky Son, Tuong Duong, Con Cuong, Quy Chau, Thanh Chuong...

In hundreds of audio files of children, fathers, mothers, village chiefs, commune women's union chairmen, local policy officers..., we realized that the word they mentioned most often was "poverty". Poverty leads to limited awareness. They think in a short-term way, what can they do to get money the fastest? The family is so poor that they sell themselves for money. The family is so poor that they let their children go out to earn a few tens of millions to buy cows and buffaloes to plow. When poor, people only wish to have enough to eat and wear. "Starve to be clean, be torn to be fragrant" is a noble morality, but not everyone understands and can do it. Dignity is something vague and distant compared to the pot of rice in the kitchen. How painful! It is the child that you gave birth to, the fetus that you carried with pain! Are they only worth a few tens of millions? Sell your children to get money to buy buffaloes and cows, to drink alcohol, to build a house... Oh my God! It seems that here, the reason of awareness is not enough and cannot be used as an excuse. Must be a question of conscience and dignity!

And, what should we do?

If human trafficking originates from poverty - as UNICEF concluded, then clearly the most fundamental and central solution is still to effectively implement socio-economic development projects, implement policies to support job creation, poverty reduction, and income increase for people in low-income areas. Along with that, integrating the work of supporting victims of trafficking back into the implementation of other projects of the program to prevent and combat human trafficking crimes and other related socio-economic programs.

Trial of the defendant for the crime of “Human trafficking”. Photo: An Quynh

According to the 2016 Law on Children, Vietnam currently has 17 agencies responsible for protecting children's rights. Faced with the complexities of child trafficking that have been going on for a long time, the alarm bell needs to ring repeatedly, urging each person, each family, each agency, department, and sector to reflect on their responsibilities. Responsibility does not only lie in statistics, administrative procedures, nor is it a responsibility that is only recognized within the scope of legal documents, but more importantly, it is a humane concern for innocent children.

Phuoc Anh