óçóçóçóç ♪♪♪ emma alberici: while italy's north is in the grips of a health emergency brought on by the coronavirus-- [dogs barking] emma: the south is confronting a crisis of its own, a ruthless new mafia. dr. giuseppe avitabile: this kind of nigerian mafia is peculiar in this place. emma: sex, drugs, and people smuggling. emma: are you still scared of them? joy ezekiel: no, why would i be scared of them? emma: the nigerians have arrived. has the italian mafia met its match?

[speaking foreign language] emma: are you scared? [speaking foreign language] ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ emma: how can a place like this exist in italy? we're just a stone's throw away from the amalfi coast and yet there hasn't been a war here or a flood or a fire or an earthquake. instead, castel volturno has been the product of sheer neglect. this is a lawless wasteland abandoned by the state. what makes this town different is that it's said to be the headquarters of a new emergent mafia,

one that's coming over on the boats from africa. ♪♪♪ emma: do you think you were in the hands of the mafia? joy: yes, i was actually in the hands of the mafias. emma: italian mafia or nigerian mafia? joy: nigerian mafias, nigerian mafias, yes. emma: only two years ago, joy ezekiel was just like these girls, running for their lives when they see our camera. on the only road in and out of castel volturno, their madams force them to sell sex day and night. they've been tricked and traded for large sums of money, often by their own families working with the nigerian mafia.

joy: all they know is money. they even changed my name. they changed my name. i was not bearing my name. they changed everything, see, i was, like, living the life for someone else. it wasn't me anymore. i was a shadow of myself, just like a living dead, as you see. emma: a safe distance from castel volturno, we meet joy for lunch. she's among the 80% of nigerian women in italy the un says are trafficked by the nigerian mafia. it's the first time joy has told her story. joy: whenever this car came, they took us to the bush. i don't know who i'm going with. i don't know who is this person. what does he have for me? is he going to beat me up? is he going to kill me? because there was nobody there--

they can just come in the car. how much the price? sometimes five euros, ten euros. emma: did they always pay you? joy: sometimes no. there was sometimes they will come, they'll show you a gun, they won't pay. they'll do what they want, then leave. emma: we are from abc australia. my name's emma. emma: it's too dangerous for joy to return to castel volturno, so another former prostitute agrees to go undercover to show how the nigerian mafia controls the women it traffics. male: all right--you are now recording. female: all right. emma: to protect them, we don't reveal their identities. male: you going to pay 35,000 euro? female: yes. male: and you don't know how you will pay? emma: this young woman says her madam is demanding nearly

$60,000 before she'll set her free. male: come, my sister, i love you, i want to help you. female: i'm scared. male: no, no, don't be scared. female: let me give you my number. male: all right, all right, all right, there is no problem. i was one like you before. i was deceived like you. you sent the money to nigeria. did you take any oaths with them? female: yes. male: oaths, or juju? we call it juju. you swear? your madam used you to swear? female: yes. male: that what? female: if i do not pay the monies, i will die. male: if you don't pay her money, you will die. emma: before she left nigeria, 23-year-old joy was also forced into a so-called juju ceremony by her family's pentecostal pastor. the woman promised her a new life in italy, food and lodgings and a job as a hairdresser.

joy took a blood oath and was told if she betrayed those looking after her, she or a family member would die. joy: so i thought maybe it was a normal thing. i did it. they cut some part of my hair, the private part, my armpit, and all the things. they cut it and they use a fowl--a chicken. they cut to do the blood, touch my head, and the--thing. emma: these voodoo rites bond nigerian women to secret and ruthless organized-crime groups known by names like black axe. joy: they're just kind of a kind of culty. it's a brotherhood coming together, fighting for no reason, just to have power, just to have a group, just to kill. happy to kill. they don't pity anyone. there is no pity. emma: no pity? joy: there's no pity. if you do misbehave or you're tired,

you can't continue anymore, they will just bring their gun and shoot, kill the person. emma: joy's dreams of la dolce vita started to sour shortly after she left her home in benin city, nigeria to travel 4,000 kilometers through the sahara to libya, and then on to italy by boat. in libya, she says she was raped by seven men in one night. in italy, her nigerian madam showed no mercy. joy: because when i came out, i was actually pregnant. i remember saying that i was actually pregnant, and four months. but she made me remove it to-- so i was forced to remove the pregnancy, and with blood and everything, you have to go to the streets. emma: was it a doctor? joy: oh, it's a doctor. at home, not in a hospital. an african man inside his house.

that's where they do it. and that's it. emma: and you had to go straight out to work. joy: yeah. [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] emma: roberto saviano has been in hiding for almost 13 years. his book "gomorrah" blew the le of italy's main mafia rings, the camorra. now it wants him dead. roberto agreed to meet us in a secret location where he's protected by his security detail.

the camorra is the presiding mafia power in naples and in castel volturno. he tells us how one of its clans is operating in tandem with the nigerians. [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] emma: roberto calls castel volturno an african city on the mediterranean, but it wasn't always.

it used to be a summer playground for the southern italian elite, but they fled when the camorra ground this place down. it's now somewhere people go to hide. almost half the town's population of nearly 50,000 are undocumented migrants. [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] emma: cooperation was forged between the nigerians and italians after a bloody turf war 12 years ago. reminders of the carnage are everywhere. one hundred twen-two bullets were fired. six africans were killed. now the camorra lets the nigerian mafia base its

european drugs and prostitution networks here, and it takes a cut. [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ emma: the pineta grande sees more drug mules than any other hospital in italy. the health system is free for all, even the undocumented migrants.

female: excuse me, have you any document with pictures? [speaking foreign language] dr. avitabile: so this is a ct scan, simple ct scan without contrast-- emma: dr. giuseppe avitabile is a radiologist here. he's stunned by the enormity of the drug problem. dr. avitabile: firstly, it was-- were young men, african people. they were used as mule, and now we are trying to-- we are seeing even women. these eggs are, like--they can contain 10, 20 grams of cocaine, highly concentrated in this stuff. and for every person, we can recognize like 30, 40 eggs in the body. so the total amount is, like, 400, 500 grams of cocaine in the body of these people. because if only one of these egg brokes,

the people can get an overdose in some minutes. it's very--the risk is very high, and a lot of people died for this risk. emma: the hospital is the only site in castle volturno that's being built up rather than run down. one hundred and thirty million dollars is being spent here. when the camorra found out, it wanted its share. [dogs barking] emma: vincenzo schiavone is the hospital's owner. when he refused the mafia's demands, they blew up his car. [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language]

emma: vincenzo takes us to what used to be his favorite beach club. he used to go swimming here with his family. [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] emma: vincenzo despairs at how the government has deserted

this once promising part of the italian riviera. all that prospers here now is the black market. ♪♪♪ emma: the sprawling headquarters of italy's anti-mafia intelligence agency, the dia, sits just outside rome. it names the nigerian mafia as a growing and violent scourge. emma: what sort of a threat does the nigerian mafia pose in italy? [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language]

[speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] emma: the team of senior analysts and detectives who work here are exclusively dedicated to hunting mafia and the nigerian connection. [speaking foreign language] emma: organized crime is now italy's biggest enterprise, worth even more than fiat. these investigators say the mafia generates income of $250 billion a year. for giuseppe governale, a sicilian, the fight against the mafia is personal. emma: in the years that you've been the head of intelligence, head of anti-mafia, have you ever felt discouraged by the enormity of the task? [speaking foreign language]

[speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] emma: director governale keeps a photo on his desk of himself as a nine-year-old. he's with the local police chief, a man he idolized as a child. shortly after this moment was captured, the policeman was killed by the mafia, blown up in a car bomb attack. director governale was born was palermo, the capital of sicily and the birthplace of italy's oldest mafia: cosa nostra. like all sicilians, he knows the brutality behind the beauty

of this place. on palermo's waterfront, an iconic image boldly remembers two celebrated anti-mafia prosecutors: giovanni falcone and paolo borsellino, murdered by the mafia in 1992. decades on, this city is now said to be the other main hub of the nigerian mafia. [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] [shouting] emma: palermo's ballaro street market,

full of color and culinary quirks, doesn't feel like a place where danger lingers. [speaking foreign language] emma: but among all the bustle, there's the hustle. the most lucrative trade here is in narcotics. ♪♪♪ new arrivals from africa who aren't granted asylum are drawn to ballaro to eke out a living in the shadow economy. they're easy prey for mafia recruiters. [speaking foreign language] emma: so, i'm here with jacob, which isn't his real name. he's asked me to protect his identity because it's only been six weeks since he was released from jail, having served 18 months for drug dealing.

now, it's not a life he particularly wants to return to, but at the moment he's in a bind. he doesn't see much of an alternative. emma: he agreed to talk to us only if we changed his voice. jacob: i was cooking drugs for them. emma: cooking the drugs? what sort of drugs? jacob: it's called crack, crack cocaine. i feel pressure because i don't have any job to do. some people who know me, they are calling me to do it for them. i refuse because i don't wanna do it again. emma: like so many others, jacob has no passport, no job, and no prospects. but the pressure to get back into the drug game isn't only coming from the nigerians.

emma: the person at the top, were they african or italian? jacob: it was always an italian. as a foreigner, you don't get to commit high crimes like he who was born here. it's his country. emma: authorities say black axe snuck into ballaro during boat arrivals in the '80s and '90s. cosa nostra has now struck an unholy alliance with the nigerians, charging them pizzo, protection money, to operate on cosa nostra land. [speaking foreign language]

[speaking foren language] [speaking foreign language] [speaking foren language] emma: an african ballaro resident agreed to help us reveal the nigerian mafia's operations, but only if we keep his identity secret. he takes a hidden camera into one of the area's 30 or so brothels. ♪♪♪ emma: they call them connection houses. sex isn't the only thing for sale here.

you can also buy alcohol and drugs, but only africans are allowed in. male: thirty-five. listen to me, one gram of heroin. male: rty-five. male: no, 35 euro. male: okay, no problem, no problem. male: okay, give me 30 minute, i'm coming. male: okay, bye. emma: when nigerian sex workers are not in palermo's connection houses, their madams force them onto the streets. we're cutting through a park on the outskirts of palermo. it's, as you can see, enormous. it's called la favorita, and it is a favorite haunt of local men looking for sex.

the price of sex with these trafficked women is less than 10 dollars. it can take them years to pay of their madams. emma: how have you managed to distinguish this as mafia activity, as opposed to any other sort of crime? [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] emma: we tracked dn the man the a refers to as the nigerian mafia's minister of defense. he's 27-year-old mohammed abubakar. he was held in custody for three years on charges of being a black axe ringleader.

i was accused, but i am not a member of black axe. i never had anything about black axe. i don't know anything about black axe. i was just accused. [speaking foreign language] emma: foreign correspondent was given rare access to film inside palermo's city court where mohammed was recently acquitted of mafia involvement. another 12 african men are still on trial, all accused by one informant, not of specific crimes but of belonging to a mafia group. [speaking foreign language] emma: the nigerians are the first foreign mafia to be tried under italy's anti-mafia laws, but palermo's prosecutors are finding it hard to make the charges stick.

five nigerians have already been acquitted. these men are appealing convictions from a lower court. defense lawyer cinzia pecoraro is adamant the whole court process is a sham. [speaking foreign language] emma: the legal system is struggling to prove the nigerians are in fact mafia, but italy's homegrown mafia is in no doubt. this hidden camera footage captured in jail shows crime bosses and brothers giuseppe and giovanni di giacomo discussing just that. [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language]

[speaking foreign language] ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ emma: back in safe territory an hour away from castel volturno, joy ezekiel is enjoying her new life making and selling african homewares. she's working with a group of nuns who've rescued 600 trafficked women in the region. [speaking foreign language] emma: after spending 12 harrowing months as a sex slave, joy reported her nigerian captors to police. [speaking foreign language]

[speaking foreign language] emma: the shop is called new hope, and that's exactly what joy has now. with a job she loves in a country she's proud to call home, she's even gone back to school. [speaking foreign language] joy: the only thing that makes me happy is that i'm free today. it's behind me now, even if sometimes i know my-- whever i go to bed, i find it difficult to sleep, but i just let it go. like, life goes on. emma: it has to. joy: life goes on. [speaking foreign language] emma: what are your dreams, joy? joy: my dreams in life is helping the less privileged and other girls that have passed through such kind of experience, to help them out, to give them courage and hope for the future.

[sirens wailing] emma: one man who will never be free from the mafia is roberto saviano. [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] emma: five plain-clothed policemen are watching roberto around the clock. he's determined to keep exposing italy's underbelly and how it interacts with the new nigerian mafia. [speaking foreign language]

[speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] emma: roberto doesn't know what his future looks like, except that he'll never stay quiet. to be silent, he says, is to be complicit. ♪♪♪