Sex, drugs and a life in limbo
After the much-publicised murder of a young Durban escort
recently, a light has been shone on the seedy underbelly of drugs and
prostitution in the city. Terence Pillay chats to Caitlyn*, an under-age sex
worker about life on the dark Durban streets.
Decent Durban suburbs are being infiltrated by drug lords, who dish out drugs on credit to young girls, with the aim of getting them addicted. Once they are in debt for drugs, they are pushed into prostitution. When the girls try to get out, they are murdered, or simply “disappear.”
Young girls in Durban are vulnerable to becoming victims of this dark under world, no matter what race or economic background, says sex worker Caitlyn, who landed on the streets of Durban at just 15 years old after an altercation with an uncle with whom she was living. When the kindness of her friends ran out, she was forced to literally live on the streets and eventually moved in with a Nigerian drug lord in Durban’s infamous Point area.
The much-publicised Siam Lee’s murder earlier this year in Durban has sparked fear in the province. The young girl, believed to have been an escort, was abducted from a brothel in an upper class Durban North suburb. Parents now live in fear that their daughters could also be drawn into this life.
It’s a legitimate fear, Caitlyn says. She never planned for this life on the streets, addicted to drugs and having sex for money with men old enough to be her grandfather. It’s human trafficking, she says. But instead of girls being traded across borders they are “recruited” in neighbourhoods previously thought to be “safe”. Then they are pimped in houses or even the local street corners; in full view of everyone, including the police.
Take a listen to Caitlyn’s interview in the podcast below.
*Caitlyn is not her real name
You can email Terence Pillay at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter: @terencepillay1 and tweet him your thoughts.