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Racha Haffar feels the weight of every word she utters: "In the Emirates, women are second-class citizens, invisible and many of us slaves."
This 31-year-old girl, the daughter of a Syrian father and a Tunisian mother, was born in Dubai (United Arab Emirates) and lived there with her family until she was 18, the age at which she finished her secondary education.
The activist, feminist and journalist accumulates several memories that marked her childhood, but she resorts to only one: one day, while she was going to the supermarket, a group of people caught her eye, agglutinated, who were making voices.
“I looked up, there was a woman on the balcony, several floors up.
She worked for a family that had gone on a trip and had been locked up at home.
They went on vacation, fell to the ground while trying to escape.
He died before my eyes ”.
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From that day on, she began to ask herself many questions: “Why was she locked up?
Why do families take over immigrant workers?
With what right can you withdraw a person's passport? "
He found no answers.
Nobody in the Emirates could explain him.
Since she was little, she was outraged to see how her two brothers had more rights and more freedom than she to play or to enter and leave the house.
He realized that he should not even ask there, and so he decided to go looking for answers in Tunisia.
"That day I told my family that we had to fight for everyone's freedom."
Now, when he is older, he resigns himself and separates his path from that of his family: "My brothers support me, but the only one responsible for my actions is me."
He left for Tunisia to study at the university, but found himself unable to speak fluent French, and so he began to look at options for studying in the UK.
“To live there I needed to find a job.
So I posted my resume online to search for babysitting jobs through
au pair programs
(baby sister).
They answered me, but they did not allow me to meet or speak with the host family.
I realized that there was something wrong ".
He did a search on Google and found information on many shady jobs that were actually a way to attract women and then subject them to sexual exploitation.
She gave up that trip and what began as a search, set her on her fight.
"Because I was privileged to have access to education and the Internet, I researched and found terrifying stories about how girls of all ages were trafficked abroad."
It replaced the United Kingdom with Italy.
He had the opportunity to do a master's degree in International Relations, Development and International Cooperation at the Universities of Tunis and Palermo.
During his stay there, he gave his path a name: fighting against human trafficking.
He began to investigate, to review the data and international legislation.
In this process, his memories in Dubai informed his search: "I saw slavery with my own eyes!"
In Italy he met Najya, a Nigerian woman who was caught with the promise of a secure job.
She traveled from her country to Italy and was sentenced to sexual slavery for 10 years.
When he told her his story, Haffar saw it in his eyes.
“His story was very similar to mine;
I just didn't become a victim, but I could have been.
I felt responsible and, at that moment, I knew that my mission was going to be to denounce the commodification of women and girls ”.
In 2011, with the outbreak of the Arab Spring in Tunisia, he wanted to do research on trafficking in his country, comparing the situation before and after the revolution.
In the climate of the protests against the dictatorship of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, he found an opportunity to address those issues that until then were untouchable.
But, she was faced with her phobias.
"I was very afraid to express my opinion, to share my arguments, afraid that others would reject me for my ideas."
That is why, he explains, he learned to work as a journalist and set out to take a camera to document that historical moment: the day when the spirit of youth for change overthrew Ben Ali.
At this stage, “we young people began to organize and get together,” he enthuses.
Haffar focused on the rights of women and girls.
In parallel, his mission was still pending: he discovered that there was no local organization specializing in human trafficking.
In 2016, he founded the first anti-trafficking organization in Tunisia,
Not 4 Trade
, after understanding the scale of the problem, the seriousness and the silence that surrounds it.
Feeling supported by international laws, she traveled alone to eight Tunisian provinces to sensitize civil society.
And, in addition, it offered to train radio and print journalists on the informational treatment of trafficking.
Little by little, she made friends with her fears, she confesses.
Millions of girls live in the dark, especially in rural areas where there is no internet access
“I had to pay more attention to refugee and migrant women.
Most of the countries in the region do not have laws that protect these women fleeing violence.
Millions of girls live in the dark, especially in rural areas where there is no access to the Internet and they are not even aware of the risks.
The same survivors that I have met knew that something bad had happened to them, but they did not have a name for it ”, denounces Haffar.
"Although there are millions of victims, there is no sense of urgency to prevent this crime."
It explains that no country is immune and yet very few Arab states are tackling human trafficking.
Egypt has organizations working on the issue;
Lebanon and Jordan are on it.
Tunisia does now have a law against trafficking and has created the National Committee against Trafficking in Persons.
This Mediterranean country has always been described as a little oasis in North Africa in terms of human rights.
However, Haffar stresses that he was surprised to find so many obstacles and difficulties for institutions and civil society to condemn "these new forms of slavery."
"Trafficking and prostitution are taboo subjects and when I expressed my desire to dedicate myself to these subjects, they recommended that I do research on Libya, not on Tunisia."
Creating
Not 4 Trade
caused him many problems that crystallized into a severe depression.
"Many times I felt alone, I organized events and no one appeared, I was demotivated, I returned to the charge, but I found an unbreakable wall: the lack of conscience."
She told herself that she was starting, that it was her mission to give this information to other people and that nothing was going to stop her halfway, but that alone she couldn't take it anymore.
The move from local to global struggle
Haffar decided to internationalize her struggle: “I had the opportunity to travel to the United States and joined UN Women and the United Nations American Association (UNA-USA).
I asked for their help, as I was a young activist in a context where no one wanted to help me.
Without support, I couldn't cope with so many silences ”.
“I don't want to go back to work and live in Tunisia.
There I have colleagues who work on the ground ”.
Now she lives in the United States and is promoting the Youth Movement Against Human Trafficking (YASM).
“It is not a local problem.
All human beings deserve freedom, dignity and respect ”, his struggle, from now on, extends to all of Africa.
She has been a Fulbright student at the University of Kentucky;
He has participated in various panels in the United States, Denmark and Tunisia.
Today, he has become one of the most specialized voices in the fight against modern slavery and inequality.
His work, little by little, has been increasingly recognized internationally.
She has received the UNA-USA Women's Rights Award, the Leadership Award from the University of Kentucky and also participates in the Obama Leaders Program.
“I want to work on a global level, this problem touches us all.
We are all responsible. "
At UN Women, within the Beijing +25 plan, Racha Haffar has been chosen as one of the 40 young leaders who belong to Generation Equality.
A network that works to promote the participation of the youngest women for equality worldwide.
Support and guide the efforts of UN Women to put new generations at the center of the process.
Every day you can come across a victim, but you can't identify her because you don't know how to read her signs.
“I have learned the importance of working globally and across the board to eradicate trafficking.
Our whole world is connected ”, she asserts, convinced that she wants to support the new generations and work locally in each community.
“I dream that this movement reaches from the east to the west.
I would love for all African countries to ratify the Palermo Protocol and make local laws against trafficking ”.
“Every day you can come across a victim, but you can't identify her because you don't know how to read her signals, we need to detect them.
We must talk about these issues in schools and in the news ”, he concludes.
“It is essential to stop one of the most profitable crimes in the world.
I no longer have a choice: I will continue walking hand in hand with other young women my age.
Many African women share this cause and the road is very long ”.
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