How secondary school girls in Nigeria run secret prostitution

While it is no longer news that prostitution is on the increase, teenage prostitution is a new phenomenon that is causing worry in the society. Teenagers of secondary school age seem to be competing with older women in a bid to sell their bodies to men.

Mary Istifanus (not her real name) 15 is a senior secondary school drop-out who has been sleeping with men for money. One might think she is in denial as she sees the act as one that is devoid of any personal gratification, saying:

    "I am not a prostitute, I just hustle to make ends meet. My father is dead and my mother who sells Akara can’t take care of us."

She explains how she got into prostitution. “My class mates introduced me to the trade. One day, they invited me to their restaurant after school where some customers gave us money. We were then invited to a particular hotel and since then, that was how I started sleeping with men for money. I was suspended from school for being rebellious and so I stopped attending”.


Another underage prostitute, 17-year-old Grace who opened up to LEADERSHIP said she was brought to Abuja from her village in Nasarawa State to work for one Hajiya who sells food in Garki Model market.

According to her, “Traders who we serve food to will dash us money and tell us to meet them in a hotel in the night. I have several boyfriends in the market; even the wheelbarrow boys you think are poor can give a girl as much as N2,000.

"This is how we make money and I send it home to my mother to help them out.”

Nobody can say what is pushing teenage girls to prostitution; most have blamed it largely on economic and social factors. Dr Adeyinka Adetokunbo, a Gynaecologist, observes that “teenage prostitution leads to negative effects on the totality of the child later on in life. Most of them have little access to healthcare and suffer extremely unhygienic conditions. It is also common knowledge that prostitution promotes the spread of HIV because most of their clients refuse to have protected sex with the girls, believing that it will bring them fresh blood.

This early sexual intercourse causes a lot of damage to children, including:
vaginal tearing, physical after-effects of torture, pain, infection, or unwanted pregnancy, depression, personality or sexual orientation confusion, problems with behaviour, insomnia and loss of self-confidence.”

She further explained that in most cases, these teenage prostitutes end up with sexually transmitted diseases as Chlamydia, gonorrhoea, herpes, human papilloma virus, HIV/AIDS, staphylococcus and syphilis. They also experience pelvic pain and inflammatory disease (PID), unwanted pregnancy, trauma, stress, depression, anxiety, and risk of self-mutilation, suicide and homicide.

Child psychologist, Peter Ishaya stated that child prostitution is when underage teenagers start experimenting with sex before their 18th birthday.

“The Jubilee Action report (1995) states that, up to 1 million female children join prostitution each year around the world. You can attribute the causes to poverty, unemployment, broken homes, and lack of education, drugs, pornography, and rebellion”.

“Prostitution leaves young girls traumatised for years. They end up not trusting anybody and become lazy because they believe that they can make quick money by just sleeping with a man. It also affects the way they treat people because they sleep with men who are their parents’ age or older. Then they tend to stop respecting adults,” he added.

Pastor John Abiyomi of Gods Light and Truth Ministry said:
“The Bible condemns prostitution under whatever guise. It doesn’t matter the age of the person, God frowns against it. It is written in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 that none of the daughters of Israel shall be a cult prostitute, and none of the sons of Israel shall be a cult prostitute. You shall not bring the fee of a prostitute or the wages of a dog into the house of the Lord your God in payment for any vow, for both of these are an abomination to the Lord your God.”

He also quotes, “In Kings 14:24 ‘Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God’. The Bible also made references to some people that practice prostitution in Leviticus: ‘And there were also male cult prostitutes in the land. They did according to all the abominations of the nations that the Lord. So you can see from the verses that God frowns at the practice of prostitution whether you are old or young. Our bodies are the temple of the Lord and we have been enjoined to keep it holy. For a prostitute is a deep pit and a wayward wife is a narrow well. Like a bandit she lies in wait, and multiplies the unfaithful among men.”

God forbids involvement with prostitutes because He knows such involvement is detrimental to both men and women. He continues, “For the lips of an immoral woman drip honey, and her mouth is smoother than oil; but in the end, she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword. Her feet go down to death, her steps lay hold of hell” (Proverbs 5:3-5 NKJV).

Prostitution not only destroys marriages, families, and lives, but it destroys the spirit and soul in a way that leads to physical and spiritual death. God’s desire is that we stay pure and use our bodies as tools for His use and glory (Romans 6:13). First Corinthians 6:13 says, “The body is not for sexual immorality but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body.” Although prostitution is sinful, prostitutes are not beyond God’s scope of forgiveness”.

By Ruth Choji

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