On February 11, at around 6pm, Fanny Kabeya, a student at the Higher Institute of Commerce of Kinshasa, left the college for her home in Bandalungwa location in the Congolese capital’s central business district.
To reach her destination, less than 10km away, the student, 22, had to take a taxi from Gombe, a posh neighbourhood north of Kinshasa.
In the Ketch, as taxis are called in Kinshasa, Kabeya found two other passengers, one of them a woman.
The driver, a young man who was enjoying Lingala music on the radio, appeared happy to have a new client, if the grin on his face was anything to go by.
For Kabeya, nothing appeared out of the ordinary as she slammed into one of the worn-out seats, her mind, unlike the stationary taxi, racing to get home as quickly as possible.
After a short while, the driver ignited the engine, signalling the start of the passengers’ trip out of the city centre.
A few kilometres farther on, they were joined by a fourth passenger, who waved down the taxi.
With the Ketch full to capacity, the driver powered the purring engine as if to please some of the travellers who were weary and impatient to get to their destinations.
A few kilometres into the journey, the young woman was in for a rude shock when she discovered that she was in the company of armed robbers, who were prepared to kill if she did not give them money.
Kabeya didn’t have a penny on her and her penurious situation angered her fellow travellers-turned-kidnappers.
“I gave them my father’s number and they demanded a ransom of $1,000 to free me,” the young woman tells Nation.Africa.
“After a few minutes of negotiation, as my father begged them saying he had no money, they lost patience and released me.”
Kabeya is one of thousands of residents and visitors who have fallen victim to an emerging crime on four wheels in Kinshasa: armed robbers and kidnappers posing as drivers and passengers in taxis.
While there are no official statistics, hundreds, if not thousands, of residents – including journalists, traders, taxi drivers and students – have been robbed at gunpoint in broad daylight.
Paul Bosa, 41, a graphic designer with Kinshasa-based Géopolis magazine, was abducted in February on his way home from work in Gombe late at night.
Bosa got into a taxi together with three other passengers, two of whom were members of a gang.
Upon alighting, the gangsters, who pretended to be headed in his direction, accosted him and robbed him of his bag and mobile phone in a poorly lit area in Ngaliema, west of Kinshasa.
For Muriel Mbuyi, who works with a communications agency in the heart of Kinshasa, the criminals struck when she was in the company of her mother in December 2021.
The armed criminals, who posed as passengers in a taxi, turned against them and demanded cash, which they did not have.
Incensed, the attackers strangled them after locking the car doors as they threatened to shoot them with a pistol.
The mother and her daughter lived to tell their tale after being saved by the mercy of one of the gang members who resisted orders to open fire on them.
“We were taken and dumped at Beatch Ngobila, one of Kinshasa’s many remote ports,” the woman recalls.
According to various victim accounts, the modus operandi of these criminals is the same: a taxi driver conspires with gangsters to pose as passengers in his vehicle.
Unsuspecting travellers then enter the taxi and the journey starts.
In some cases, the vehicle leaves the stage with only one or two travellers, with the driver promising to pick up more passengers along the way.
As the journey progresses, the taxi doors are locked and the windows are raised.
The bogus passengers then swing into action, pulling out their armour, in most cases knives and pistols, as they demand cash and other valuables from travellers.
The criminals mostly target well-dressed passengers, especially women, carrying expensive jewellery, phones, laptops, iPads watches and other valuables.
To better conceal their plan and make their targets comfortable, police say, the gangsters are increasingly including young women in their ranks.
But not all drivers are part of the criminal enterprise as some have fallen victims just as their passengers.
Police records show tens of drivers have been attacked, robbed, shot, killed and, in cases where they survived, their cars stolen.
In 2020, a driver popularly known by the name Zico was stabbed to death by criminals who posed as passengers in Maluku, a suburb more than 50km from Kinshasa International Airport, east of the capital.
Another lifeless body, believed to be that of a driver whose car had been stolen, was dumped on Poids Lourds Road in Barumbu, north of Kinshasa, in December 2021.
Luckier drivers are drugged and their cars stolen, and Tusevo Mbiya is one of them.
“Two men asked me for a three-hour rental. Their to-do list included shopping, meeting their partners in several locations of Kinshasa and to settle some business. At the end of the negotiation, the two clients got on board and dictated the route,” Mbiya, a driver from Kasa-Vubu in central Kinshasa, told Le Phare newspaper.
“While waiting for their friend, who lived in a hotel, they took a break and shared some bottles of fresh milk. I was given one. After drinking the milk, my eyes became heavy with sleep.”
The driver was left unconscious on the roadside in Limete, east of Kinshasa, as the thieves zoomed off in the stolen car.
Taxis are easy targets for the gangsters because the crime agents can isolate and corner their victims.
Public transport buses in the capital are mass transit vessels and are relatively safe, except for crowding, delays, lack of comfort, and pickpockets and other petty thieves.
The wave of robberies, car thefts and killings has attracted the attention of the government, which is scrambling to slam breaks on the criminals on wheels.
In 2018, for instance, all taxis were ordered painted yellow and registered with the governorate.
All Ketch drivers are also required to display their identification number and turn on the interior lights when it gets dark.
Cars with tinted windows were also banned from Kinshasa roads.
Compliance with the new rule has remained the biggest challenge in restoring safety on the capital’s roads.
In Kinshasa and several major cities, some taxis have been painted yellow but many with tinted windows still operate with impunity.
A crackdown ordered by Gentiny Ngobila Mbaka, the governor of Kinshasa, at the end of 2020 has done little to rein in the transport sector that drives the economy of the city.
At the height of the operation, ”more than 600 criminals operating in Ketchs taxis were arrested and brought before the competent courts”, the governor said.
More than a year later, broad-daylight armed robberies, kidnappings and car thefts have resumed.
Jean Mutombo, the president of the Congo Drivers’ Association (ACCO), acknowledges that the criminals are still operating in Toyota ISTs. BY DAILY NATION