New Light on Sex Trade

Source:PlusNews
Photo:Eva-Lotta Jansson

Article:SWAZILAND: Risky business: report sheds new light on sex trade

*The following are excerpts from the aforementioned article:

Selling sex for extra income
An increasing number of factory workers were also resorting to sex work, or "night duty", to make ends meet because they were underpaid,

"These are industrial workers; these are working women, they are not prostitutes. If they are forced into prostitution it is because they are not paid enough to support their families. The price they pay is HIV infection

The rising number of women resorting to sex work has been attributed to worsening economic and humanitarian conditions in the country.

Instances of violence against women engaged in commercial sex were also documented. "Some were taken to bushes and threatened with death by customers who refused to pay, whilst others were injured on duty," said Thwala-Tembe.

The survey distinguished between working women who engaged in sex for cash - usually in parked cars or at the homes of clients whose spouses were absent - and women who had multiple sex partners as part of economic arrangements. Such women would be homeless if they could not spend the night with one partner, and hungry if they were not given meals by a second sex partner.

Their highest-paying clients were members of parliament, religious officials, lecturers at the University of Swaziland campus adjacent to the Matsapha industrial estate, police officers, businesspeople and well-heeled tourists.

A session with a sex worker costs a typical client R50 (US$7), but can escalate to R1,000 ($146) for some pastors. Member of parliament and other wealthy clients reportedly paid nearly R3,000 (US$439) per session.

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*Note the abovementioned excerpts are direct quotes from the article and thus all credit and references should be afforded to the authors/sources.