Mercy House South Africa - a Shelter for Victims of Human Trafficking
June 22, 2014
In 1998 our congregation, the Sisters of Mercy, saw the need to offer special assistance to victims of domestic violence in South Africa, and so in 2000 we opened a shelter for these traumatized women.
This transitional home is a place of safety for women in distress. Here they receive basic comforts and professional care according to their needs. We offer individual counselling as well as skills training so that the women can regain their self-worth and become financially independent.
In 2004, IOM (International Organisation for Migration) identified our shelter as one that could offer a place of safety to victims of human trafficking. We entered into an agreement with IOM, so that women could be sheltered in our home while awaiting repatriation or reintegration under the Assisted Voluntary Return Programme. In 2011, the funding from IOM was withdrawn. In 2013, the Department of Social Development began to give a 40% grant for victims of human trafficking.
To date we have accommodated about 300 victims of trafficking. The majority of these have been women from Thailand, but there have also been a few women from other African states – Lesotho, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, the Cameroons and, of course, South Africa. Usually we accommodate the beneficiaries for 2 to 3 weeks while their travel documents and tickets are processed by the embassies. A few (those whose cases have gone to court) have remained with us for longer periods. At the moment two South African women are state witnesses in a trafficking case. They have been in Mercy House since May 2013. Each woman has her own needs and we treat each accordingly.
In our shelter, we have set aside one of the rooms for victims of trafficking- a comfortable, quiet, private place where the healing process can begin.
Often the women are traumatized when they arrive and all they want to do is sleep for the first day or two. This room is a refuge within a refuge – a place to rest, read, write and chat to others in their own language.
When they arrive at the shelter their immediate needs are assessed and met wherever possible. They are provided with toiletries and clothes. Many of the women come only with the clothes they are wearing – and if they have been rescued in a police raid, this could mean that they only have a T-shirt over their underwear.
Culturally, food is very important: it is a link with home and the familiar. We even talk about comfort food - food that makes us feel “at home”. We encourage the women to do their own cooking and preparation of food because this is therapeutic. We buy the ingredients that are needed for cultural dishes and this enables the women to enjoy “home cooking” – something comforting and enjoyable.
The women may also receive individual counselling offered by our social worker, especially those who stay with us for a longer time. Language can be a challenge, but the social worker and the house mothers have learnt a few essential words and sentences in Thai, French and Portuguese.
To help them feel more at home, we have books, magazines and DVDs in different languages.
We also encourage the women to take part in the activities in the skills department or the garden, where they can share their talents or learn new skills. It is a joy to watch the skills being taught in sign language and smiles.
On the property, we have a prayer room which is used for prayer meetings and bible sharing, but many of the women use it for their own private meditation – and they are encouraged to do so. Victims of trafficking often cling to their faith when all else fails them. We do not promote any specific religion, but allow each woman to find her way in her own faith. Most of the victims of trafficking who have stayed with us have been Buddhist. They have found a special tree under which they meditate.
Victims of internal trafficking - South Africans - need a place of safety while they are reintegrated into society and reunited with their families. Some need to learn skills that will empower them, help them find employment and make them economically independent and so protect them from being trafficked again. These are the services that our shelter, in partnership, the Department of Labour and the Department of Social Development, try to provide.
The staff of Mercy House also facilitates training workshops on human trafficking for social workers, house mothers, police officials, nurses, teachers. We also offer awareness workshops for schoolchildren, seminarians, women’s groups, youth groups.
There is also a Rehabilitation and Healing programme – a 10 week programme aimed at helping victims to reintegrate into society and to regain their self-worth. Our social worker facilitates training workshops on this programme for other social workers and shelter managers.
Colleen Wilkinson rsm
