By Daniel Tyokua
The police in Abuja yesterday announced the smashing of a gang of criminals that abducted and killed the Zonal Officer in the office of the Auditor-General of the Federation (AGF), Mohammed Danjuma.
The police stated that after killing him, the gang withdrew money drom Danjuma’s bank account with his Automated Teller Machine (ATM) Card and purchased a Mazda car with the money.
The politice said the vehicle had been recovered and in custody as well.
Those in apprehended and detained in connection with the crime are Chukwuebuka Obiekulia (aka Ebuka-Jesus, 25); Sadiq Abubakar (aka Alhaji or Doggy, 21); Daniel Owowo (26); Friday Musa (aka Afra, 20); and John Shedrach (24).
They were arrested by detectives from the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Police Command at their hideout in Tasha 1, Gwagwa, between May 20 and 27.
Danjuma’s remains were reportedly recovered in the Gwagwa-Kagini area on March 16, after he was dispossessed of his valuables, including the ATM card, which was used to withdraw money from his account.
Preliminary findings revealed that the deceased boarded the syndicate’s cab (One-Chance) as a passenger from Berger en-route the Tipper Garage, Katampe, but was diverted by his assailants to an unknown location, where he was attacked with a wheel spanner and dispossessed of his valuables.
Confirming the incident on Wednesday, the FCT Police Public Relations Officer, DSP Anjuguri Manzah, said the detectives recovered Mazda 626 car with number plate KWL 132 CN and another Mazda 323 car with number plate CF 123 KSF, from the suspects.
He added that “they will be arraigned after investigation”.
Recall that issues of One-Chance criminals have been on the rise in the FCT, but the activities of the police towards curbing such is less than satisfactory.
Sometime last year, staff members of a popular media outfit, WAZOBIA/Nigeria Info, were attacked by operatives of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad near the old NYSC national headquarters, because the media personnel dared to chase one of such One-Chance syndicate group identified by one of them as having attacked him sometime before them.
While the media workers chased and cornered the suspected criminals to a dead end of a Close in Area 3, SARS operatives who were invited to arrest them turned around and beat up the media personnel, arrested and detained them at their detaintion center at the old Abbatoir.
Up till now, it is not known that any member of that SARS squad was reprimanded, let alone dismissed and charged to court for alleged connivance with those alleged One-Chance syndicate.
Also, unscrupulous elements have turned every road juction to car park, blocking the road to peaceful roadusers, festering criminality and default of traffic regulations on such spots, while both the FCT, Police Command, other security operatives, and the FCT Transportation Secretarariat looked on while criminality build up in the nation’s federal capital.
In addition, motor parks in the country are notable spots for the merchandising of all kinds of illicit and narcotic substances, including illegal arms merchandising, but our security agencies looked the other way and pretended it did not matter.
There is also dangerously growing incidences of young men who block public highways with nails laced to wood, logs of wood and other dangerous items, under the pretext that they are Local Government Revenue Agents, Task Force Operatives, or Agro-Produce Inspectors.
All these are happening inspite of several directives by successive Insoectors-General of Police to Divisional Police Officers (DPOs) to clear off such spots, some of which have recently turned to be dean for robbery syndicated and other criminals elements, but these directives Hebrews been kept in the breach by the DPOs over the years due to percuniary reasons, while criminality rises.
