Kenyan sues job agency over Myanmar trafficking
Okindo alleges he was taken to Myanmar under deceptive circumstances.
The High Court has issued temporary orders barring a labour recruitment agency from sending Kenyans overseas for employment.
The directive follows a petition filed by Duncan Okindo, one of the victims of human trafficking, against Gratify Solution International and its executives.
Okindo alleges he was taken to Myanmar under deceptive circumstances.
Now, two months after returning home empty-handed and emotionally scarred, survivors of the Myanmar trafficking ordeal are beginning their legal battle in pursuit of justice.
Duncan is among the many who left Kenya hoping for better opportunities abroad, only for the dream to spiral into a harrowing ordeal.
In court filings, Duncan is seeking to have Gratify Solutions, along with Virginia Wacheke Muriithi, Boniface Owino, Ann Njeri Kihara, and other agency officials, held responsible for allegedly coordinating and facilitating his trafficking to Myanmar.
He claims the respondents misled him with a job offer in Bangkok, Thailand, promising a customer service position.
However, upon arrival, he says he was secretly ferried by boat into Myanmar, where he was coerced into working in a scam compound.
There, he was forced to engage in what he describes as sophisticated criminal operations, including cyber fraud.
"I didn’t realize it was a scam city at first they were hiding everything," he told Citizen TV in an interview.
Duncan accuses Gratify Solutions of involvement in human trafficking, modern slavery, and practices that violate human dignity.
The respondents allegedly lured unsuspecting Kenyan youth under false promises of well-paying jobs in Bangkok, only to smuggle them into Thailand on tourist visas.
From there, the victims were reportedly transported by boat to Myanmar and handed over to criminal networks, where they were forced to work in online fraud schemes.
The High Court has issued interim orders preventing Gratify Solutions and its officials from recruiting, transporting, harboring, exploiting, facilitating, or participating in the export or deployment of Kenyan workers abroad.
The matter is scheduled for hearing on June 12, 2025.
