Saatchi and Saatchi South Africa has joined forces with the International Organization for Migration's (IOM) Southern African Counter-Trafficking Assistance Programme (SACTAP) to create a hard-hitting message aimed at raising awareness of human traffickers operating on the continent.
Based on research in the region since 2002, IOM believes that trafficking in persons is flourishing in Southern Africa, with South Africa and its expanding sex industry the main destination for trafficked women in the region.
IOM estimates that at least 1,000 women are trafficked from Mozambique each year into South Africa, with poverty a huge factor in their susceptibility. IOM is also aware of women trafficked to South Africa from South East Asia, Eastern Europe and other African countries.
The tv ad conveys the chilling duplicity of human traffickers and was flighted on SABC1, SABC2, SABC 3 and e-tv in primetime slots, as well as CNN and BBC World on DSTV, which broadcasts throughout Southern Africa.
The story focuses on a young rural African woman who is lured to travel to South Africa with the false promise of a modelling career. The woman is not aware of her trafficker's deceptive ploys, but the audience is alerted through a series of subliminal phrases that appear around her - in text on a passing taxi and via graffiti on a wall, for example.
These subtitles reveal the truth: the girl is being trafficked into forced prostitution.
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