A Voice For the Voiceless

MISSION

The Advocacy Project seeks to help community-based advocates produce, disseminate and use information, and so become more effective advocates for human rights and social justice

Africa – Pygmies

This section contains reports written by the World Peasants/Indigenous Organization (WPIO) .

Historically, slavery involved the buying and selling of people and their transcontinental shipment. Since the world largely abolished the slave trade in the 19th century, modern practices of slavery are often described as discrimination.  However, the current conditions of this widespread practice subject upon pygmies, or indigenous peoples, and the underprivileged, are those of slavery.
 
Across Africa, masters force pygmy communities and poor peasants, including the women and the children, to labor and sexually exploit these vulnerable populations for little or no pay.  In the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the pay for one week, long hours from Monday through Sunday, consists of basic food supplies or 500 Congolese Franks, equivalent to $US 1.  These payments allow slaves to survive and to provide for their families’ shelter.  And although the masters do not call such exploitation slavery, the conditions are the same. 

Visit WPIO's blog to learn more about the plight of pygmies and what is being done to help them. 

In Summer 2008, AP sent Peace Fellow Juliet Hutchings to Kampala to work with WPIO. Read her blog!