Paradise for pedos
This is the English translation of OneWorld’s ‘Paradijs voor pedo’s’, an article by Sanne Terlingen that was originally published in Dutch on 28 June 2012 here.
Ghana is ideal hunting ground for Dutch child sex tourists. Paedophiles present themselves as benevolent benefactors and, despite Dutch and Ghanaian law, enjoy impunity.
Ruth is 17 and, since 3 am, has been awake. Nerves. Why? She wonders. This is her tenth time in court, even though she knows her opponent, the Dutch millionaire, won’t show up – just like all the other times.
But, just in case, at exactly 9 am, she takes her place on the wooden bench in courtroom 20 at the Coco Affairs Court in the Ghanaian capital, Accra.
Her Uncle Asare, who made the five-hour trip from his village, is sitting to her left. To her right, her ward ties a red ribbon on Ruth’s pigtails to match the turtleneck shirt she put on for the occasion. “So the judge can see she is decent girl,” says the Ghanaian woman who has been taking care of Ruth since they together reported the case one and an half years ago.
“I was eight years old when I was first raped,” says Ruth, “he pretended to take care of me and paid my school fees.”
Whenever he visited Ghana, he asked for me to be brought to him to come and collect my money. Every time I had to stay and sleep with him. According to Ruth, the man, who is from the Dutch province of Limburg, has abused at least two other girls. “I know because I slept next to them when he did it,” she says.
He is not the only Dutch paedophile in Ghana. Within seconds, the Dutch expatriate community can pull up a number of compatriots with paedophilic tendencies. ‘The Meat Merchant’, a rich importer whose affection for small children was reported to the police by his own daughter. A 50-something who likes wearing Ghanaian clothes and has had a “more than father-son” relationship with several boys who lived with him, as confirmed by his own housemates. Then there’s ‘Tall Ad’, whose neighbours describe how he drives slowly through the streets seeking “water-vending girls who smile back at him”. Ones to his liking are invited to his home for fried rice and watching movies on his laptop. Continue reading “Ghana: A Paradise for Pedophiles”
