JAMAICA: The Other Side of Paradise

By Kathy Barrett
NEGRIL, Mar 16 (IPS) It's just before midnight, and the music
pulsates through the massive speakers perched under the ceiling, scantily
clad girls in their five-inch heels moving closer to the iron poles.

To the rhythms of reggae and dancehall music, they sashay onto the
platform, grab the poles and dance like molasses sliding down a wooden
banister.

This is the scene in "Scrub a Dub", the exotic adult nightclub
in the picturesque tourist resort town of Negril on Jamaica's west
coast.

Misty, 24, has been dancing for just over four years. She came to Negril
from the capital Kingston, 222 kilometres to the east. Her story is one of
hopelessness that drove her to the resort town in search of a better life.

"My life was hard, I needed to make more money. A friend told me to
come to Negril where I could work in the tourist industry," she said.

But she was disappointed to find the jobs in the luxurious all-inclusive
hotels were hard to come by.

"My friend took me to this club and they wanted dancers. I was afraid
at first, but now I make good money and I can take care of my two-year-old
daughter, the men tip well. I hope to become the best dancer in
here," Misty said.

Misty is not alone. Hundreds of girls, many under the age of 18, flock to
this tourist mecca and knowingly or unknowingly are drawn into the
commercial sex trade. This is the other side of paradise, a hotbed of
human trafficking, prostitution and drugs – a stark contrast to the Negril
promoted around the world with its seven miles of white sand beaches.

Rev. Margaret Fowler is a minister of religion and social worker who came
to Jamaica over 20 years ago from Scotland. She runs a foundation to aid
women and girls who have been drawn into the commercial sex trade.

"It's a modern-day slavery because the people have just been
dragged into some kind of bondage," she told IPS.

With the support of her church, Fowler pledged to make a difference, no
matter how small. In 2005, she established the Theodora Foundation with
funds from the U.S. Agency for International Development to conduct
research on human trafficking in Jamaica and help affected women.

Perched on a hill in the western end of Negril, the foundation has a
halfway house for girls who are at greatest risk. Under the watchful eye
of house mother Yvonne Ramsay, Theodora House is home to up to four girls
who stay there for a maximum of two years.

"Here at Theodora House we want to show them [the women] real
alternatives to the life they knew and show them that there is a place
where they can be loved without giving anyone anything in return,"
Ramsay explained.

The foundation also works with youth in Negril who are susceptible to
exploitation in their search for a way to survive. It offers classes in
reading, math, business, computer science and life skills.

Most of the students, including a few young men, can read only at the
fifth-grade level. The teachers work to get them to the point where they
can take entrance exams to enroll at a national training institute.

"Our task is to give them information, so they can say 'I
don't have to do this'," Fowler said. "The temptation
is there, when you are poor and have no money …if we can get them to
the stage where they don't have to go down that road, we have done a
good job."

There is one group of young women that Fowler still hopes to reach – young
girls under the age of 16. This is one of the dark secrets of Negril,
spoken about by very few.

The prevalence of girls, some as young as 13, was confirmed by
"Shoeshine", whose real name is George Coombs.

Shoeshine, 51, is a transvestite who moved to Negril from the eastern
parish of St. Mary years ago.

Living in a crudely built one-room hut just on the outskirts of the hotel
strip, he knows the ins and outs of all the underground establishments
geared towards the commercial sex trade. He even opens up his house to
those who wish to get involved with the young girls.

"You have young girls, it's not legal, I can show you plenty of
them… they come from all over, the older dancers bring their daughters
into the business, the white people want the young girls," he said.

Negril is especially impacted by sex tourism, which thrives in this
popular tropical vacation destination. It is primarily poor women and
girls, and increasingly boys, who are trafficked from rural to urban and
tourist areas for commercial sexual exploitation.

The problem is growing across the island, prompting the government in 2007
to implement the Trafficking in Persons Act, which prescribes penalties of
up to 10 years imprisonment.

A study that year carried out in Kingston, the tourist capital of Montego
Bay and Negril found that "girls as young as 13 are full-fledged
prostitutes." It said some of them live on their own, while others
are taken to holding areas in the communities and used as dancers in the
more popular nightclubs.

But a renewed crackdown appears to be bearing fruit. In the last two
years, eight suspected cases of human trafficking have been successfully
investigated and brought before the Jamaican courts. In 2009, five raids
were conducted, resulting in four arrests and three prosecutions.

The government has established a trafficking-in-persons unit that operates
within the police force and has five detectives.

For the Theodora Foundation, a success story is already in the making.
Camile, 28, dropped out of school at 16 and headed to Negril to work as a
bartender, but in her words, things just didn't work out.

"I even tried to commit suicide at one time, but now being at
Theodora safe house, they have helped me to be more confident and have
more self-control," she said. "I know that I will reach there,
this is where I see myself, working in a big business place, coming out in
my heels and suit… I want a job to take care of my mother and my
son."

"Before living here, I would be on the street, the men would have to
have sex with you before they give you anything," she said. "But
I now have hope… I will be okay."

*The dancers used pseudonyms to protect their identities.