Sailor: I want Abu Sayyaf wiped out

Mohd Ridzuan Ismail

TAWAU: “I want the Abu Sayyaf wiped out.” This is the fervent wish of freed hostage Mohd Ridzuan Ismail.

He does not want anyone else to experience the eight-month ordeal he went through with four other sailors as captives of the terror group in the jungles of Jolo Island in southern Philippines.

Ridzuan is still trying to overcome the trauma of being held hostage, under constant threat of beheading, until his release last month.

“In Jolo, I would dream I was free in Tawau. But now that I am free in Tawau, I dream I am a hostage in Jolo,” he said at his wooden house in Kampung Tanjung Batu here.

Ridzuan expressed relief at the news that several Abu Sayyaf members, including the notorious Muamar Askali @ Abu Rami, had been killed by Philippine security forces.

The 33-year-old sailor said he was preparing himself mentally to join the Malaysian Maritime Enforce­ment Agency (MMEA) and help to keep the Abu Sayyaf from entering Sabah waters again.

“I want to use my experience as their captive to protect Sabah from these ruthless kidnappers,” he said. “I hope I can join the MMEA.”

The five sailors, who are all related by blood or marriage, were grabbed from the tugboat Serudong 3 in Dent Haven waters off Lahad Datu on July 18.

Ridzuan, who spoke to The Star by phone in September during his captivity while Abu Rami’s group stood guard over him, said the gunmen had put a knife to his throat and pointed a gun at his back.

When Ridzuan was taken, his daughter was only three months old. Now almost a year old, the infant still looks at him as though he were a stranger, he added. “She is still getting to know that I am her father.”

Ridzuan, who is from Jengka in Pahang, met his wife, who is from Tawau, in Johor.

In an interview with The Star together with businessman Mohammad Jeffrey Rosman, who has been helping the families of the sailors, Ridzuan said he could not identify his captors because they were masked.

He said that whenever the Philippines conducted military operations against the group, they had to go on the run many times. Often, they went without food and survived by drinking ditch water.

“Our prayers kept us alive,” said Ridzuan, who added that the Malaysian hostages experienced three “wars” between the Abu Sayyaf and Philippine security forces during their captivity.

“During the clashes, we could feel the bullets whizzing by us,” he said. “The worst was when the security forces fired mortars. The ground shook. There were times I thought I would die.”

Like Ridzuan, the other freed hostages – Abdul Rahim Summas, 62; Tayuddin Anjut, 42; Fandy Bakran, 27; and Mohd Jumadil Rahim, 24 – are still grappling with their trauma.

Abdul Rahim, who sustained a leg injury while in captivity, is unable to walk and has to use a wheelchair.