June 15
Dakar, Senegal - Tens of thousands of elementary school-age girls work in Guinea for no pay as household servants in conditions akin to slavery, according to a report released Friday by Human Rights Watch.

The girls, some as young as 5 years old, cook, clean, fetch water and care for the host family's own children. They are often promised money but the majority are never paid. The few that are paid receive on average less than $5 per month.

Known in Francophone West Africa as the "petites bonnes," or little maids, the girls often work 18-hour days and are prevented from attending school.

Although some host families give the children a bed, many sleep on the floor. They are typically shunned by the rest of the family and forbidden from taking their meals with them. They eat scraps, like the burnt rice at the bottom of the pot. Physical abuse, including rape, is common, the report said.

Parents see it as a way of making sure their daughters are at least fed. Others hope that by giving their girls up they will receive an education, said Kippenberg. There are examples of children that had a positive experience and received an education but the system is largely one of exploitation, riddled with abuse.

While a large portion of the children are sent to live with aunts, cousins and distant relatives, many are also sent to live with strangers. That is typically the case for girls trafficked to Guinea from other African countries, the report says.

West Africa, the report explains, is one of the world's poorest regions and includes its five poorest countries, as ranked by the United Nations Human Development Index.

Even though Guinea is the world's largest producer of bauxite, the raw material used to make aluminum, it is ranked 160th out of the 177 countries on the index and the majority of its 10 million people live in crippling poverty. go