By Kingsley Omonobi Of the myriad unpleasant things that occur daily in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja, none unsettles residents as much as a negative phenomenon that has come to define the town’s ecosystem. Like a bad omen, the tragedy foisted on the city is ingeniously captured as ‘One Chance’ by evil merchants who use privately owned vehicles to cause havoc. Under this well-organised crime ring, the daredevils typically pose as genuine commercial vehicle operators, lining up the sprawling roads as innocent and hardworking commercial drivers seeking passengers to ferry safely to their destinations for an agreed fee. But that is only a facade that has often taken many commuters into their early graves. They are fake drivers on the prowl seeking to deceive and lure victims into their dens for either ransom or other pecuniary reasons. Many female victims have not been lucky to return safely from the grip of the villains to tell their stories of torture, rape and organ-harvesting. ‘One Chance’ implies that the vehicle will proceed to the desired location once the last passenger boards. Commuters, often desperate to find vehicles—especially during rush hours when vehicles are thinning due to the high cost of fuel, purchase, and maintenance—are lured to board these vehicles in large numbers. It is a simple demonic trick that has worked perfectly for the perpetrators and terminated the lives and future of many of those who fall victim to the merchants of deaths. The truth is that once the victim boards the dangerous vehicle, which serves more as a caravan of death, the occupants and the driver who belong to the same gang, suddenly brandish guns, charms and other dangerous items to scare the ‘lone’ stranger in their midst and threaten them with death unless they meet whatever demands are placed on them. Usually, if the long passenger is a female, they either rape her and demand a huge ransom to be paid within a tight deadline or be killed, or they brutally kill her and harvest her vital sex organs for rituals. This pattern has become commonplace in Abuja in recent months and weeks, sending shockwaves across the city and causing horror and heartbreak to families whose members’ lives have been brutally cut short by these gangs of evildoers. This onslaught on the unsuspecting commuters has resulted in frequent deaths and the recovery of bodies on roadsides. In recent weeks, the situation has grown from bad to worse even though the police and security agencies continue to dispute the clear evidence that the menace is taking a worrisome dimension in the city as one attack follows another in quick succession. Incidents mount One of the two most recent and worrisome incidents that shook the FCT to its foundations, occurred on January 3, 2026, when Chinemerem Chukwumeziem, a nurse with the Federal Medical Centre, Jabi, was lured and killed by ‘one chance’ vehicle operators after she closed from work and innocently boarded the doomed vehicle at night. Her lifeless body was recovered the following day by the roadside after information filtered into town that she never reached home 24 hours after closing from work. The criminals were said to have used a screw-driver, hammer and scissors to inflict pain on the victim while demanding ransom before murdering her and dumping her body along the highway. As if that was not gruesome enough, the harbingers of death also snuffed the life of another woman, identified as Princess Mediatrix Chigbo, whose body was also found on the roadside after the ‘one-chance’ operators had killed her after taking all the valuables they found on her. The practice of deploying what is supposed to serve as commercial vehicles to rob, steal and kill has become routine in the FCT. A survivor, Umar, recounted his harrowing experience with ‘one-chance’ criminals, highlighting the need for constant vigilance among commuters. He said “sometime in 2025, I boarded a vehicle from a place where cars usually pick up passengers. There was a driver and one man in the front seat. Then another man sitting at the back, which I joined. Everything looked normal until we moved. A few minutes into the ride, I became uneasy, seeing how these people were staring at me and at each other. So, I told the driver I wanted to alight at the next bus stop. All of them got infuriated by this request. “At that moment, I sensed that something was wrong. I questioned the driver because I felt I had the right to ask what was happening. The man sitting at the back started attacking me. I was slapped and beaten”. Umar said that as he struggled to regain balance, the one with him pulled out a gun and pointed it at his head. He said they tied him up and forced him to transfer money into an account they provided. “They made me transfer N500,000 from my account. They se
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