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ZAMBOANGA CITY: Muslim gunmen have freed late Thursday four
kidnapped workers of a rural electric company in Basilan Island,
police said.
Police said the four were released at around 8
p.m. in Al-Barka town, a known stronghold of the Moro Islamic
Liberation Front (MILF) rebels. Police and military linked the MILF
and the smaller Abu Sayyaf group in the June 26 kidnapping of the
workers, all employees of the Basilan Electric Cooperative Inc.
The freed hostages—brothers Alberto and
Emilberto Singson; Paul Herowig and his brother Birin—were
released to emissaries of Basilan deputy governor Alrashid Sakalahul
in the village of Magcawa, said Senior Superintendent Salik
Macapantar, the island’s police chief.
Vice-Governor Al-Rasheed Saka-lahul of Basilan,
in a TV interview, confirmed that a minimal amount of P89,000 was
given to the kidnappers in exchange for the release of the four
workers. He explained that aside from his personal money, employees
of the electric company, as well as the families of the hostages,
raised the amount for “board and lodging” fees.
The gunmen freed one hostage, Ronnie Tansiung,
in Tuburan town last month where the five had been kidnapped while
reading electric meters. The kidnappers originally demanded P1
million, but raised their demand to P2 million after private
negotiators intervened.
The kidnappers threatened to execute the four
workers remaining hostages unless ransom is paid. Police tagged MILF
leader Usih Muslim and Abu Sayyaf commanders Nurhasan Jamiri and
Furuji Indama as among those who seized the workers.
Basilan island Governor Jum Akbar, head of the
local crisis management committee, designated her deputy to
negotiate for the safe release of the hostages, said Macapantar.
Macapantar said he ordered police commandos to
prepare to hunt the kidnappers by daybreak on Friday. “We will
launch a pursuit operation by day break to neutralize the Abu Sayyaf
and MILF rebels involved in the kidnappings,” he said.
A faction of the Abu Sayyaf last month kidnapped
an ABS-CBN television presenter Ces Drilon and her cameramen Jimmy
Encarnacion and Angelo Valderama, including a Muslim university
professor Octavio Dinampo, in nearby Sulu province. They were freed
a week later in exchange for a huge ransom.
Philippine military chief Alexander Yano said
the Abu Sayyaf, which was originally fighting for the establishment
of a strict Islamic state in Mindanao, had been reduced to being a
bandit group. But the United States tagged the Abu Sayyaf group as a
foreign terrorist organization with links to the al-Qaeda and Jemaah
Islamiah.
-- Al Jacinto with AFP
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