State visits and World Bank decisions seem to make up the lion's share of news that reaches us from Africa. Here PNS correspondent Samuel Sarpong reports on matters a little closer to everyday life, and in a way that reminds us that there is more than one understandable English in the world. Sarpong is a journalist who writes for a variety of publications from Accra, Ghana.

ACCRA, GHANA -- It happened on a Friday night. Afi Dogbe, then 10, was asleep when she was awakened by her mother to accompany an elderly woman to the city. She had no knowledge of what she was to do in the city.

When she probed, the mother shouted at her, "Just pack your things, I say." She picked up her few belongings -- two dresses and a pant -- and was swallowed by the dark.

When it dawned on her that the two-hour journey from her village to Lome, the capital of Togo, had run into four hours, her suspicions were aroused, but she could not understand what was amiss.

Unknown to her, her mother had arranged for her to be taken to Ghana, so the rest of her family could do with the little food in the house.

It is three years now since Afi left her native Togo. All these years have been a nightmarish experience, years of maltreatment from her "new mother" here in Ghana.

Afi's story represents a new phenomenon, one that was overlooked in the jostling for headline space until police here broke up a ring trafficking in Togolese kids. By conservative estimates, hundreds of children have been brought into Ghana under bizarre arrangements -- some to serve as househelps. Others have been sold into perpetual slavery.

A tip-off led police to rescue Afi at the house of a Nigerian, Hajia Sidi Musah, described by police as the brain behind the business. Police say she confessed to recruiting young girls age 10 to 14 from Togo to serve as househelps and led police to four Togolese accomplices.

Afi, who says she has been kept at Hajia Sidi's house for three years, led police to three other girls who Hajia Sidi had contracted out. All were brought into Ghana under bogus arrangements, including Ana Gbekah, 14, who was sold three years ago for a paltry 60,000 cedis (about $25). She complains, "I always thought of running away but I didn't know where to go. Besides, I didn't have the means to move."

For now, these two girls are under police protection. "We need to uncover the activities of the various syndicates. We are going all out to track down the people involved in this illicit trade," says Angu Awuni, director of police public relations.

Many Ghanaians have been shaken by this discovery. "I'm lost for words. How can this be happening here?" asks Kofi Amofa, a sociologist.

But Akua Afriyie, a trader, is not surprised. "I got to know about this about five years ago when a woman who sells next to my stall went in for a Togolese child."

Togo lies on the eastern fringes of Ghana. About 80 percent of its 4 million people are engaged in subsistence farming.

"Despite a constitutional declaration of equality under the law, women continue to experience discrimination especially in education, pension benefits, inheritance and as a consequence of traditional law," says Mawuli Acolatse, a Togolese.

He attributes the child trafficking to severe deprivation. "Child trafficking is not any strange thing in Togo." In rural Togo, parents sometimes force young children into domestic work in other households in exchange for cash.

The government has done nothing to stop this practice. Harsh conditions in the rural areas leave women with little time for activities other than work in the fields.

Togolese laws protect children's rights, but there is little enforcement. The law does not specifically address the question of forced or bonded labor, including that performed by children. International trafficking often results in the children being taken to other West African countries, the Middle East or Asia, according to informed sources in Togo.

Child trafficking services have also developed sophisticated marketing strategies, keeping their eyes on the bottom line.

The fact is that there aren't many saints on the face of the earth. The traffickers have figured out a way to make a buck. It's ridiculous and demeaning.