The Root Causes of the Girl Prostitution in Tanzania. A Case of Arusha Municipality

Abstract

Abject Poverty has been an impetus of girl child prostitution in many urban cities of Tanzania, Arusha Municipality being among them. In a research conducted in Arusha Municipality between January and July 2011, with the aim of investigating the main causes of persistence of girl child prostitution, a sample of 200 respondents was selected, whereby 100 young girls were involved in an indepth interview while another sample of 100 respondents drawn from different stakeholders was included in focus group discussions and other research methods utilized in the study. From the research it was discovered that about 80% of the girls interviewed were forced into prostitution by either their poor family situation or by other reasons like peer pressure, culture, parent lack of responsibility reasons, lack of employment, growth of the city and globalization. However, the study found out that the girls in prostitution face a lot of social, physical, psychological and health problems which require more actions from all stakeholders despite the little efforts currently done. It is thus from this study that the research team recommends that all stakeholder should join forces in enforcing laws and by laws which protect these young girls from the hands of cruel customers, pedophiles and pimps. Apart from that the research team emphasizes on the importance of counseling and sex education to the girls who lack self esteem and are hopeless without any skills to help them out of that situation.

Key words: Abject poverty, education, drug abuse, violence, globalization