More than once, Abuja’s ‘One Chance’ robbers resurge

The ‘one-chance’ robbery style in Abuja, the nation’s capital, is giving residents serious cause for concern.   Though the police say it is decreasing due to several measures being put in place against it, residents and victims say ‘One Chance’ robbery style is actually on the increase. It is usually carried out in commercial vehicles, […]

The ‘one-chance’ robbery style in Abuja, the nation’s capital, is giving residents serious cause for concern.

 

Though the police say it is decreasing due to several measures being put in place against it, residents and victims say ‘One Chance’ robbery style is actually on the increase.

It is usually carried out in commercial vehicles, where criminals pose as passengers only to turn against other passengers in transit. It was a major security challenge in the capital a few years ago and with recent spikes in the number of victims, it is clear it is still a prevalent problem.

The term ‘One Chance’ derived from the Pidgin English expression of bus conductors or touts enticing passengers in a hurry to take the last available space in a taxi or bus, has now been adapted to mean being in a fix or a difficult situation.

Many of the red municipal buses that linked the city centre to the suburbs have since been decommissioned and are now wasting at the Abuja Municipal Transport Company park along Kubwa Expressway.

As a result, with the chaotic public transportation need between the city center and satellite towns, private vehicles have become the only alternative for people to reach their destinations, and also pose the greatest risks.

Most residents (especially those that make use of commercial transportation) have either had encounters or known someone that had an encounter with the criminals.

Their mode of operation, according to the police and some arrested suspects, is for the criminals to disguise as commercial motorists or passengers, take unsuspecting passenger(s) and after driving for some distance, rob them of their belongings and drop them off or throw them out of the moving vehicle.

Car snatchers have also keyed into this style of operation. A suspect recently paraded by the police said they normally pretended to be passengers, stopped commercial motorists and snatched the vehicle from them after threatening them with arms.

The suspect, David John, 28, said, “We would just stop a car and tell the driver to take us to a certain place and when we get there, we would drag him out of the vehicle and take it away.”

He said his three-man gang was able to snatch three vehicles using this mode of operation.

The notoriety of these criminals became so pronounced that the FCT Police Command had to create a special Anti One-Chance Squad headed by a Chief Superintendent of Police to curb the menace.

On September 12, the command announced that the new squad had recorded some successes when it paraded a suspected kingpin of three one-chance robbery gangs in the city along with members of his syndicate.

The Deputy Commissioner of Police in charge of Criminal Intelligence & Investigation Department (CIID), DCP Salisu H. Gyadi-Gyadi while briefing journalists said the new squad smashed the three gangs and recovered their operational vehicles on September 6 and 7 at Akaraka Gosa and Nyanya axis.

He gave the names of the suspects as Julius Uche, 38 (kingpin),  Micheal Okafor, 27, Ogbonna Nwovu, 28, Ike Ugwuke, 36, Christian Nwite, 28, Lucky Nwakona, 22 and a woman, Joy Hagba,  34.

Joy Hagba told journalists that she was conscripted into the gang when she went to see her boyfriend.

Explaining her role in the syndicate, she said whenever they went for an operation, she would be taken along to make passengers believe that the vehicle was a genuine commercial vehicle and not occupied by robbers.

This improvisation by the gang, police said, was because the criminals noticed that people had become wary of entering vehicles occupied by only male passengers, hence a female presence always allays passengers’ fears.

“Often, they operate four in a vehicle, with a lady just to create an impression that it’s a genuine commercial vehicle. He (Uche) is the kingpin, because he also has other deployments. He is not just an operator, but he has boys under him that he deploys for such operations and they report to him,” the Command’s spokesman, DSP Anjuguri Manzah, added.

Victim identifies septuagenarian suspect…

Earlier in August, the command arrested a 75-year-old man while allegedly trying to escape after a failed ‘one-chance’ robbery in Lugbe.

The septuagenarian, Eze Nmwo, was reportedly arrested along with two others, Peter Isioma, 40 and Blessing Anaba Ayomide (F), 32 when an earlier victim identified them as they were attempting to rob another victim.

Police said the suspects were arrested on August 7.

“The suspects were identified by one of their victims at a bus stop in Lugbe while trying to lure another unsuspecting victim. The suspects operated in a red Volkswagen saloon car which has been recovered as exhibit,” police said.

A deadly gang

While most activities of such gangs involve use of arms to threaten victims to relinquish their properties, sometimes they turn deadly.

In September, police arrested a member of a four-man gang that allegedly killed one of their victims in Kubwa.

Narrating how the victim was killed, the command’s spokesman said investigations revealed that the gang took the victim as a passenger and as they tried to rob him, there was a struggle in the course of which one of them shot and killed him.

“In the course of investigation on September 4, we arrested one of them, Emmanuel Nwori, a taxi operative in connection with the gruesome murder of one Umo Monday who boarded the taxi as a passenger.

“They took away his phone and dumped the remains at Federal Housing flyover, Kubwa. Investigation is on-going,” he said.

While fielding questions from journalists, the suspect said he was arrested when the mobile phone of the victim was traced to one of his friends who led the police to him.

“I am the driver of the group. We just carry our victims like normal passenger and after robbing them we drop them off along the road. I don’t know how they got the gun we used in the operation, I am just a driver although I am aware of the group’s operations,” he said.

Another suspect paraded for using the one-chance method for car-snatching, Anthony Oke, 25, told journalists that during their last operation before he was arrested, when they wanted to snatch a car, but the owner of the car resisted them.

“He started dragging the steering wheel with me and another car hit us and the car somersaulted but I was able to escape only to later hear that the owner of the car died. We didn’t shoot the person,” he said.

A victim who prefers anonymity told our reporter that some of the one-chance robbers go beyond merely robbing their victims to using them for rituals. Narrating her ordeal, she said while she was lucky to escape, she believes some were not as lucky.

Police efforts

The command’s spokesman, DSP Anjuguri Manzah told our reporter that from police observation and feedback from the members of the public, the crime is “actually on the decrease” because of measures being taken against it, adding that the new Anti One-Chance Squad was created to complement existing measures.

He said among the measures was a robust public enlightenment campaign by the command on the need for members of the public to be vigilant, stressing that the command uses the media to educate members of the public on the mode of operation of the gangs to alert them.

According to him, the gangs pick passengers that are in isolation, thus, members of the public have been advised to avoid being in isolation whenever they want to board commercial vehicles and they should also alert the police when they see suspicious vehicles.

Manzah added that apart from the fact that major arrests and prosecution of one-chance robbery suspects are being carried out, the command has also reeled out distress call numbers and engaged in strategic deployments to curb the menace.