4 teachers appeal for freedom

Four university teachers, kidnapped in the southern Philippines a week ago, were shown tearfully appealing to the government to free them in a video aired on a local television station in Manila yesterday.

"We are begging to you Madam President (Arroyo) and to the senators to please help us," said one of the hostages, Salvacion Mikin, as she broke into tears in the video apparently taken in an unknown hideout in the South.

The video, aired on GMA television, showed Mikin and her three companions, all teachers with the Mindanao State University, who were kidnapped from a minibus in Lanao del Sur on Sept. 13.

Another hostage, Emma Karaan said, "I’d like to inform my husband that I am okay and fine... I am sick actually but don’t worry about me and just pray for us that we may be freed soon."

Hostage Edita Bontilao, meanwhile, said between sobs: "My children, please don’t worry about me. We are all in good hands. We are fine. Our captors are really kind, I tell you."

None of the kidnappers were shown on the video but GMA television identified them as members of the Pentagon group, a notorious kidnapping gang of former Muslim separatist guerrillas who are known for abducting Christians and foreigners for ransom in the south.

However Col. Ernesto Boac, the military commander of the area where the kidnapping occurred, said that the abductors were former security guards of the Mindanao State University and were demanding P2 million and the ouster of the university president Camar Umpa, for the release of the four captives.

Boac said a team from Manila was negotiating for the hostages but that troops were on stand-by for a possible rescue attempt.

Commenting on the video, he said a television crew may have been invited by the kidnappers to get some footage of the hostages.

The abductions came despite President Arroyo’s launching of a campaign earlier this year to crush kidnapping-for-ransom gangs which have blackened the country’s image and scared away foreign investors and tourists.

On Sept. 17, unidentified gunmen freed two children of a wealthy legislator Julio Ledesma amid broad hints that a ransom was paid for their release. — AFP, Roel Pareño