By: Inês Almeida and Salomé Fernandes
The Macau SAR Government ‘does not completely meet the minimum standards in the eradication of human trafficking’ thus remaining in group two of the surveillance list, according to the U.S. State Department report on human trafficking. For the second year in a row the territory is part of a group of countries and regions with space to improve in the fight against human trafficking.
The document says that the Macau SAR Executive did not show ‘additional efforts’ compared to the previous period despite having made an effort to identify trafficking victims and establishing a partnership with an NGO to return an underage victim to her home. The report also acknowledges that several people were trained in this area, with 5.5 million patacas spent on victim protection services.
On the other hand, Washington says that ‘the authorities investigated fewer cases and were unable to secure a single condemnation for sexual trafficking for the third consecutive year and have never secured a condemnation for human labour trafficking. So, for the second consecutive year, Macau remains in the second group of surveillance’.
Under this scenario, the U.S. Administration again makes recommendations, including ‘significantly increasing efforts in investigation, prosecution and sentencing of individuals for sexual trafficking and labour trafficking; provide training on trafficking laws; consistently improve and implement victim’s identification methods, especially among vulnerable groups such as migrant workers and children exploited by the sex industry’.
The State Department also flags the need to improve efforts in identifying labour trafficking victims and male victims, particularly, ‘namely, among the migrant population’. Additionally, the Macau SAR should ‘increase its protection of foreign domestic workers, introducing a minimum wage and promoting campaigns about sex trafficking so that visitors understand that paying to have sex with children is a crime’.
The official report also illustrates its position with the fact that local authorities only investigated three suspicious cases in 2017. In one of them the term used was ‘recourse to prostitution’ and there was no prosecution under the trafficking statute. ‘The government achieved no prosecutions for sex trafficking for the third consecutive year and has never managed one single prosecution for labour trafficking’.
According to data provided to Tribuna de Macau newspaper by the Social Welfare Bureau (IAS) two victims were entered into their database in 2017 and just one in the first quarter of 2018, all of Chinese nationality and ‘all were minors and victims of sex trafficking’. Of all the victims that the IAS has accompanied throughout the years, the youngest was 13 years old and all were victims of sex trafficking.
Thus far, all children have returned to their countries of origin, as ‘IAS proceeds to return all children victims of trafficking to their countries of origin, mainly through the International Organization for Migrations or other public entities in Mainland China’. Last year, the local public department received no help requested through its ‘24 hours hotline to denounce and request help related to the fight against human trafficking’.
IAS also provides assistance to victims, a responsibility delegated from its inclusion in the Commission for the Study of Measures to Dissuade Human Trafficking, comprising representatives from several public departments. In 2017, the Commission received 3.6 million patacas for its annual budget, a 400 thousand-pataca increase from the previous budget.
Macau mainly a ‘destination’ of human trafficking
Following the trend of the previous five years, Macau is mainly a destination of human trafficking and, although less relevant, a transit location for women and children in sex and forced labour trafficking. The document also mentions that ‘the victims of sex trafficking originate mostly from Mainland China and Southeast Asia. Many come from northern provinces of Mainland China and travel to the Guangdong Province border looking for better job opportunities’.
Additionally, ‘many trafficking victims reply to fake job ads, including in Macau casinos, but as soon as they arrive are forced into prostitution’, says the report. According to the U.S. State Department, traffickers often source victims from ‘massage parlours, illegal brothels, apartments and houses, where they are subjected to close surveillance and threatened with violence, while forced to work long hours and have their documents confiscated’.
Construction workers and domestic workers ‘may become vulnerable to labour exploitation’, claims the USA document, citing cases of traffickers who bring people to Macau so that they can renew their work visas in other countries and, while here these individuals have their freedom restricted and are even captive, while their passports are taken from them, in a clear indication that they are forced to work to pay off incurred debt’.
The report points to some official measures that may increase the already vulnerable situation of migrant workers, such as the impossibility to acquire a work visa within six months should they be fired with just cause or resign without just cause, as well as the lack of a minimum wage for foreign domestic workers.
The Labour Affairs Bureau has investigated 13 complaints for excessive commissions charged by job agencies, four of which were confirmed and two are still under investigation.
Secretary for Security criticises “incorrect allegations”
The Secretary for Security has rejected the U.S. State Department report’s conclusions on human trafficking, which still classifies Macau as a group 2 member of the surveillance list.
The Secretary says that the government “has persisted, with great determination, in the fight against human trafficking”.
A reaction from the office of Wong Sio Chak says that ‘for several consecutive years now, we notice a lack of solid research behind the conclusions of these reports, which contain baseless and unfair allegations about Macau’s situation’,
From the Secretary’s perspective, the report mentions “unfounded allegations that Macau is a destination or a transit location for women and children, victims of human trafficking, as well as cases of labour coercion . . . Macau’s security authorities cannot accept such statements and express their strong indignation regarding this incorrect interpretation of Macau’s situation, which includes untruthful conclusions and unfounded allegations”.
*Exclusive JTM/Macau Business
