For children’s rights activists like Deleli Kpeglo, efforts to combat child trafficking in Togo have often produced dispiriting results. ”We’ve tried everything possible, but such efforts have not been effective. Child traffickers keep coming back and taking away more children,” says Kpeglo, who works for Plan Togo, an NGO.
Newly-elected Togolese President Faure Gnassingbe and various opposition leaders were in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, on Thursday for talks on resolving tensions in their West African country. Togo was plunged into turmoil when military officials appointed Gnassingbe head of state shortly after the February 5 death of his father, Gnassingbe Eyadema, who had ruled the country since 1967.
A number of refugees who fled Togo because of violence sparked by the country’s April 24 presidential election have reportedly started going home. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) was quoted as saying that several hundred people have returned to the Togolese capital, Lomé, over recent days.
Dozens of newspapers, scores of radio stations and five television channels … at first glance, Togo seems like a media junkie’s dream destination. But does being spoilt for choice translate into press freedom? This question has received an airing in recent days, thanks to a report by the Paris-based media watchdog Reporters sans Frontières.