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205 10w The Story of Elsie A Case Study of Trafficking in Contemporary South Africa susan kreston Elsie was born in the Eastern Cape to a mother who did not want her. Elsie does not know her date of birth, so she’s never celebrated a birthday. She never knew her father and was raised from infancy by her maternal grandmother , who took care of Elsie until her death, when Elsie was ten. Upon her grandmother’s death, Elsie went to live with an aunt and uncle. Shortly thereafter, her trafficking saga began, when she was sold by them to a German man, who sexually exploited her as well as giving her drugs and alcohol. Elsie decided to run away. She began to live on the streets. She became friends with a girl, Thandi, who told her that she could make money if she moved in with her and her Nigerian boyfriend, a trafficker named Hennie. Elsie stayed with them and got involved with drugs and was forced into prostitution to support Hennie. She would make about R4,500 a day, about R1,500 in the morning and R3,000 in the night. Her clientele was dangerous. Moreover, Hennie raped Elsie and threatened to kill her. He also began to beat her when she didn’t want to work, so she ran away again. She then began to work for a third trafficker, who also raped her, so once again she ran away and was prostituted at the hands of a fourth trafficker. She continued to be sexually exploited, and she started stealing and robbing to make the money demanded of her by the trafficker. She did not want to work on the streets but was repeatedly beaten to make her continue. During this time, she was using drugs and the trafficker raped her on several occasions. She made friends with one of the other girls, Zola, who also was exploited by the trafficker. One particular day, the trafficker made a call and the girls heard him discussing money. The girls were given some money to go away and buy themselves something nice. The girls became suspicious and started 206 w Susan Kreston talking about running away. They were overheard, though, and as a punishment , they were locked in the flat where they lived. During that time they were given no food, but copious amounts of drugs. At the end of the week, trafficker number five arrived at the flat, gave the girls new clothes and new phones and took them to the bus station, where he gave them round-trip tickets to Bloemfontein, the largest city in the Free State, in the center of South Africa. The girls were told that it would be nice there, that there wouldn’t be any drugs, that they would not have to work on the streets anymore, and that they would be taken care of. When the girls arrived in Bloemfontein the return half of the ticket was destroyed and they were taken to trafficker number six. The girls were forced to work on the streets. The trafficker told them that he had paid a lot of money for their new clothes and shoes and cell phones and that now they had to pay him back. The trafficker told them that it was their job to make him rich. This trafficker wanted to advertise Elsie’s “services” in the newspaper and wanted her to work in strip shows. She refused and was beaten so badly she could not walk or wash herself for a week. The trafficker refused to take her to a hospital because he was afraid she would disclose her situation. Eventually it was arranged for a doctor to come to Elsie, and she survived. The doctor never reported her abuse to anyone. Zola then fell in love with their trafficker, which upset Elsie very much. Because of this Elsie decided to report what was going on to the police. The police used her information to raid the place where the girls were held, but then simply gave Elsie a bus ticket back to the Eastern Cape, without involving social services in either Bloemfontein or the Eastern Cape. On returning to the Eastern Cape, Elsie moved in with trafficker number seven. As with all the other traffickers, Elsie was forced to bring back a certain amount of money on a nightly basis or face the brutal consequences. One night Elsie got into a car with a john who took her...

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