Lawyer Kidnapped While Returning From Call-to-Bar Ceremony Regains Freedom on Her Birthday
The story of Peace Onyesom Udoka, the young lawyer who was kidnapped while returning from her call-to-bar ceremony and later regained her freedom on the day of her birthday, is both tragic and symbolic of the times. It is a story about the resilience of individuals, the trauma of families, the cruelty of criminal syndicates, and the chronic failure of the Nigerian state to guarantee safety on its highways. To understand her ordeal is to place it within the broader fabric of insecurity that has defined life in Nigeria in the past decade. What should have been a moment of joy, accomplishment, and transition into professional life became a nightmare that highlighted how the roads that connect Nigerian states have become theatres of fear and despair.
Peace, like many of her peers, had just completed the arduous process of legal training at the Nigerian Law School and had been called to the bar in Abuja on September 23. For every law graduate, this is the day they finally wear the wig and gown, the day that years of academic struggle culminate in recognition as an officer of the court. Families gather, parents beam with pride, and siblings accompany the new lawyer to mark the occasion. For Peace, her sister Gift was her closest companion on the journey. The excitement of the event and the celebrations that followed masked the danger that awaited them as they set out for Benin.
The Abuja-Benin route via Okene and Auchi has long been notorious for armed robberies, kidnappings, and violent ambushes. Yet, like countless other Nigerians, Peace and her sister braved the road, because to travel is to risk in a country where alternatives are scarce. Air travel is costly, not every city has an airport, and the rail system remains limited and unreliable. By September 26, as they made the journey southward, their lives would take a devastating turn. Somewhere along the Okene-Auchi axis, heavily armed men blocked their path. The sisters, like many victims before them, were dragged away from the vehicle and into the forests that stretch endlessly along that corridor.
News of their abduction spread quickly after family members confirmed that they had been seized. For those who knew them, disbelief turned into horror. How could a young woman who had just been admitted to the bar, who should have been planning her career, her practice, and her future, suddenly be reduced to a bargaining chip in the hands of kidnappers? The trauma was compounded by the fact that she was not alone; her sister was also taken. Families of victims of kidnapping in Nigeria often describe the helplessness that comes with the first phone call from abductors. It is a moment that collapses all illusions about security. One moment you are praying for safe travels, the next you are calculating ransom demands and scrambling to contact anyone with influence.
In Peace’s case, the abductors wasted little time. Within days, the family confirmed that a ransom demand of forty million naira had been made. The figure was astronomical, especially for middle-class families already struggling with the costs of education, travel, and day-to-day survival in a battered economy. But the kidnappers were unyielding. They knew the emotional value of their captives. To them, Peace was not just another passenger—she was a lawyer, recently celebrated, someone whose story would resonate and attract attention. In Nigeria’s warped economy of kidnapping, such details often determine the price tag placed on human lives.
As the family negotiated, appeals went out on social media. Activists and well-meaning Nigerians raised alarm, demanding that authorities intervene. Among them was Harrison Gwamnishu, a human rights advocate known for amplifying such cases. His involvement brought greater visibility, ensuring that the story was not just another statistic buried in local police reports. Yet, visibility rarely guarantees safety in Nigeria’s kidnap industry. For every celebrated case, there are countless others forgotten. Families of victims often have to make impossible choices—whether to wait for authorities who are often ill-equipped and underfunded, or to quietly pay the ransom in hopes of securing release.
As the days passed, Peace’s family endured sleepless nights. Birthdays are normally occasions of joy, but this one was shadowed by fear. For her parents, the thought of their daughter spending her birthday in a forest camp controlled by armed men was unbearable. Kidnap victims in Nigeria frequently describe the conditions of captivity: crude camps, minimal food, constant threats, and physical abuse. The psychological torture is perhaps even worse than the physical deprivation. To live at the mercy of men armed with AK-47s, men who view you as nothing but a transaction, is to live in suspended terror. Every rustle of leaves, every whispered conversation, every passing hour can feel like a countdown to death or freedom.
On September 30, the day that marked her birthday, fate finally turned. Gwamnishu announced that Peace and her sister had regained freedom. They were released to authorities at a village near Okpella, not far from the place they had been seized. The news spread rapidly, and for those who had followed the ordeal, it felt like a rare moment of relief in a country accustomed to bad news. The symbolism of her release on her birthday was not lost on many. After days of despair, her family celebrated survival and life. Yet the details of the release remained opaque. No one disclosed whether ransom had been paid, and if so, how much. In Nigeria, such silence is common. Families often choose to keep the truth hidden to avoid further targeting or to protect themselves from social judgment.
For Peace, the experience will likely remain a scar. To survive kidnapping is to carry invisible wounds. Even after release, victims often struggle with post-traumatic stress disorder, recurring nightmares, and an enduring sense of vulnerability. The road that once connected Abuja and Benin will now always represent terror to her. She may struggle to sleep without reliving the voices of her captors. Yet, she is also a symbol of resilience—of the possibility of surviving Nigeria’s many tragedies. Her story now joins the countless narratives of survival in a nation where danger lurks on highways, in schools, in villages, and even in the heart of cities.
The larger question is why such ordeals continue to occur with alarming frequency. The kidnapping industry in Nigeria has thrived for more than a decade, beginning with the militancy in the Niger Delta, mutating into the terror of Boko Haram in the North-East, and spreading into banditry in the North-West and Middle Belt. What used to be politically motivated hostage-taking has become an industry sustained by guns, poverty, weak policing, and complicity of some state actors. Every successful ransom emboldens another group. Every failure to prosecute kidnappers sends a message of impunity. The forests of central and southern Nigeria have become sanctuaries for armed groups who know that security forces lack the intelligence, coordination, and resources to flush them out.
The Abuja-Benin route, particularly the Okene-Auchi axis, is a notorious corridor for this criminal economy. For years, reports of abductions have surfaced from that stretch of road. Students, traders, civil servants, and entire families have been seized, with many paying ransoms to secure release. The economic toll is massive. Beyond the money paid in ransoms, there is the cost of fear. People avoid travel, businesses decline, tourism suffers, and social mobility shrinks. The very idea of being a Nigerian on the road has become synonymous with anxiety. That a young lawyer like Peace could not celebrate her call-to-bar without being dragged into this vicious cycle reveals how deeply insecurity has seeped into the social fabric.
The government’s response has often been reactive rather than proactive. Statements of condemnation, promises of rescue operations, and occasional arrests punctuate the news cycle, but the systemic drivers of kidnapping remain unaddressed. Poverty, unemployment, porous borders, proliferation of small arms, corruption within security agencies, and the absence of modern surveillance systems all fuel the crisis. In the case of Peace, there has been no official explanation of how she was rescued or what measures are being taken to secure that corridor of road. The silence is deafening, but it reflects a broader national culture where victims are relieved to survive and governments are relieved to deflect blame.
For Nigerians, stories like Peace’s resonate deeply because they mirror everyday fears. Parents sending children to school, professionals traveling for work, traders transporting goods, all live with the dread of abduction. In this sense, Peace’s survival is both a personal victory and a collective moment of reflection. She survived, but what about those who never return? What about those whose families cannot raise the ransom? What about those whose bodies are found in shallow graves after weeks of captivity? Each kidnapping is a fracture in the already fragile social contract between citizens and the state.
The symbolism of her birthday release cannot be overstated. Birthdays are markers of life, of growth, of hope. To be released on such a day is to be reminded of the thin line between life and death in Nigeria. It is as if fate conspired to return her to her family at the very moment when they had almost lost hope. For her parents, it must have felt like giving birth all over again—not in a hospital ward, but in the harsh theatre of Nigeria’s insecurity. That paradox will remain etched in their memories: the worst and best moments collapsing into one day.
As Peace attempts to rebuild her life, her story will likely inspire others. She is not just a survivor; she is a lawyer, someone who has been trained to defend rights and challenge injustice. Perhaps her ordeal will strengthen her resolve to use her profession as a tool for justice. Perhaps she will become a voice for victims of kidnapping, for reforms in the justice system, for accountability in government. Or perhaps, like many survivors, she will choose silence, retreating into private healing. Whatever her path, her name is now part of Nigeria’s collective memory of survival and struggle.
The story of her release, however, does not end the broader tragedy of kidnapping in Nigeria. Until the structural problems are addressed, more Peace Onyesoms will be dragged into forests, more families will negotiate with kidnappers, and more birthdays will be spent in captivity. Her release is a reminder of resilience, but also a warning of the fragility of life in a country where the state has abdicated one of its most basic responsibilities—the protection of its citizens.