Two Ugandan Women Arrested in Thailand After Earning Shs59m a Month in Prostitution

Two Ugandan women arrested on the Thai resort island of Koh Phangan last weekend have told police they were each earning as much as 500,000 baht a month, roughly Shs59 million, from offering sex services to foreign tourists, a figure that surpasses the total monthly pay package of a Member of Parliament back home.

Janat Nakalema, 32, and Mariam Namatovu, 29, were apprehended on Sunday night at an unnumbered house in Village 2, tambon Koh Phangan, where a foreign customer was also present. They were taken to Koh Phangan police station and charged with assembling in a place of prostitution and publicly soliciting for prostitution.

The arrests came after an Israeli tourist filed a complaint alleging he had been robbed. Thai tourist police launched an undercover sting in response, with an officer posing as a customer and contacting the women through WhatsApp. He agreed to pay 5,000 baht for two encounters, after which police entered the house and found the suspects allegedly providing services to a foreign male tourist inside the property.

During questioning, the women admitted they had travelled to Koh Phangan as tourists but had used the island as a base for illegal sex work for more than two months, seeing three to four foreign clients a day and serving more than 180 clients in total over that period. They said most of the money had been sent back to their families in Uganda.

The earnings they described dwarf what most Ugandans in formal employment take home. A Ugandan Member of Parliament earns a gross monthly salary of approximately Shs11 million. Even with the full package of allowances factored in, the average gross monthly income for a Ugandan MP sits between Shs25 million and Shs35 million, still far below the Shs59 million the women say they were making each month in Thailand.

The arrests came shortly after Phuket Immigration separately arrested five other Ugandan women for allegedly offering sex services in the Patong entertainment district, following public reports about their activity in the Soi Bangla area.