Father sells daughter for qat money [Archives:2008/1139/Reportage]
By: Abdulqawi Shi'alan
For Yemen Times
Having no money to buy qat and cigarettes, Ahmad Al-Dhabri sold his eldest child, 11-year-old Aisha, for YR 30,000, or approximately $150, and forced his three other children to beg on the streets, thereby exposing them to molestation and other forms of abuse.
However, the Prosecution's investigative minutes reveal that Al-Dhabri has been found guilty of mistreating his children and hasn't rule out his involvement – along with his second wife and his brother – in selling Aisha after the prosecutor heard testimony by one witness after another and verified that their testimonies were identical in support of a June 12, 2007 lawsuit the victim's mother filed against the father.
Aisha's younger sister Karima died as a result of being run over while begging late one night in Hawdh Al-Ashraf in the presence of her brother Marwan and sister Enas, who since then have been educated and received kind treatment by their father in Taiz.
It's been seven years since Aisha's father sold her to a stranger for YR 30,000 and the location of where she's living now still remains unknown. Some say she's in Aden, while others claim she appeared once in Yemen's eastern Al-Mahrah governorate before crossing the eastern border into Oman in the company of the man who bought her. After divorcing Ahmad Al-Dhabri more than 10 years ago, Aisha's 45-year-old mother Hamama remarried a man from Dhamar governorate. She's now filing a lawsuit against her ex-husband, who was found guilty of selling Aisha and neglecting his other three children. “He mistreated them and forced them to beg on the streets to bring him money for qat and cigarettes,” Hamama testified tearfully in a Taiz court.
After bursting into tears at the court, she was asked about what had happened. “They sold my daughter to an unidentified individual for YR 30,000,” she answered. When asked, “Who sold your daughter?” she replied, “Her father, her paternal uncle and a Somali woman,” adding that she searched for her everywhere, but couldn't find her.
“I went to Aden, Sana'a and several villages in Taiz in search of her. Additionally, I made an appeal on Yemen satellite channel's television program, “Nauh Al-Tayyur,” but no one responded. Only God knows where my daughter is after being sold by her inhuman father,” she recounted as she continued crying.
“Even worse, my second husband practices all types of insult and humiliation against me when I ask to visit my children, always refusing to allow me to go to Taiz, where they live with their father, my ex-husband.”
According to Hamama, her second husband also is cruel, hardly allowing her to contact her children. “When I finally managed to visit my children at their father's home, I didn't find Aisha there. When I inquired as to her fate, the only response I got was, 'She's at her uncle's house and in good condition,'” the mother recalled.
“Even though I knew her uncle was an indecent man, that was enough to assure me, so I returned to Dhamar without seeing her. However, I eventually discovered that she wasn't at her uncle's home, but that she'd been sold to an unknown individual, according to eyewitnesses. I believe that her father, uncle and stepmother – the Somali woman – are responsible for her fate.”
New neighbor brings trouble
Hamama's friend Minal Al-Qubati maintains that because he was extremely jealous of his wife, Al-Dhabri used to lock her in their home whenever he left. “Hamama was always surprised at his behavior, finding him sitting alone in his room for several hours every day.
“After a while, she got a new neighbor of Somali origin but with a Yemeni father. Her name was Hanan. She established a strong relationship with Hanan and used to exchange visits with her, thereby unwittingly helping her husband learn about Hanan and then form a suspicious relationship with her, which Hamama discovered,” Al-Qubati recounted.
“Aisha's mother couldn't do anything to force her husband to break off his suspicious relationship with Hanan, who subsequently married him. Immediately divorcing Hamama, he retained their children, including Aisha, who lived with him and their new stepmother.”
According to Al-Qubati, police frequently arrested the lighter-skinned Aisha when they found her begging in the company of black-skinned children from Yemen's marginalized social group. After her mother's divorce, Aisha spent most of her time jailed in police stations or mistreated by her father and her uncle until she disappeared.
In suing her ex-husband for mistreating their children and forcing them to beg, Hamama discovered that their father and stepmother had beaten and tortured them severely. Eastern Taiz Prosecution's investigation minutes reveal that Aisha was sold to an unidentified individual, an act for which the abovementioned three perpetrators are primarily responsible.
Mother sells henna
Hamama began selling henna while moving from one city to another and from house to house in search of her daughter, choosing this particular job in the belief that it would facilitate her entry into numerous homes and communication with many women she doesn't know. The job also helps her make money to live on throughout her long journey of searching for her lost daughter.
The bereaved mother also contacted fortunetellers in Sana'a and other areas while selling henna, but they gave her false information about where her daughter is living. Some claimed Aisha was in Hadramout, while others said she was in Aden.
Most Yemenis know that these fortunetellers, pretending to have accurate information and facts, usually lie. In any event, Hamama was misled or confused by these fortunetellers, none of whom gave the same location where Aisha was living.
One female fortuneteller told Hamama that Aisha was married to a man in Hadramout, which is 800 kilometers east of Taiz, and that he often beats her. So she traveled to Hadramout only to discover that the fortuneteller was lying because Aisha wasn't there.
Father and uncle deny charges
Jobless, Aisha's 45-year-old father denies the Prosecution's charges against him, instead alleging that police and his district's chief broke into his home and kidnapped her. Asked why he hasn't searched for his daughter until years after her disappearance, Al-Dhabri justifies his inaction due to being assured by the district chief that Aisha was living in the home of her paternal uncle, Abdu Al-Dhabri, a 33-year-old taxi driver.
Fearing that his brother may charge him, Aisha's uncle Abdu disclosed to the prosecutor that her stepmother Hanan told him that her father had handed her over to strangers on Taiz's Bir Bash Street.
This matches what her mother Hamama said, also citing Aisha's stepmother as saying this. Both her uncle and stepmother separately revealed the specific date when Aisha's father handed her over to strangers more than seven years ago.
A YR 30,000 price tag
Responding to the Prosecution's questions, Hanan said her brother-in-law Abdu one day came with his mother and told her that Aisha had run away a year before, adding that she had been found by Dhirba district's chief in Taiz, who handed over her and two dark-skinned boys to the nearby police station. However, asked to claim his daughter, her father and uncle refused to do so until a medical team examined her.
According to Hanan, Abdu Al-Dhabri returned with two other men and chewed qat together in the home of Aisha's father, who was unavailable at that time.
The three then went out, taking Aisha with them, and she hasn't returned home since.
Eyewitnesses, including Hussein Mohammed Ali, testified to the Prosecution, revealing that Ahmad Al-Dhabri personally sold his daughter to a stranger for YR 30,000.
Selling children is a crime
According to her mother's friend Al-Qubati, who also is an attorney, selling children is a flagrant crime, particularly when the perpetrators are their parents, who facilitate such trafficking as a result of poverty. She says that after being sold to strangers, such children may be exploited for dangerous purposes, such as the selling their organs or being forced to work in risky environments.
“Many Yemeni children often are smuggled to Saudi Arabia or Oman, where they work at underpaid jobs and are exposed to physical risks,” she continued, citing Article No. 248 of the relevant law, which reads, “Anyone found guilty of trafficking children shall face no less than a 10-year term of imprisonment.”
Another persistent problem in Yemeni society, according to Al-Qubati, is child torture, aside from the fact that all international human rights conventions and legislation – which the Yemeni government has signed and ratified – ban such torture.
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[archive-e:1139-v:18-y:2008-d:2008-03-20-p:report]
