CAMP SIONGCO, Maguindanao, Philippines – The military and the ceasefire committee of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) are joining hands to rescue a Chinese-Filipino hardware store owner who was kidnapped in Cotabato City last Monday.
Col. Ernesto Aradanas, commander of the Army’s 603rd Infantry Brigade, said an MILF representative, Nasif Mohammad, is now coordinating with the military to help authorities locate kidnapped businessman Nelson Tay.
Tay, 37, owns Asian Marketing, a hardware store and exclusive dealer of imported foams for mattresses and furniture.
Military and police intelligence sources have tagged two notorious Moro bandits, Jerry Kadil and a preacher named Ustadz Manguda, as among the armed men who snatched Tay from his store in Cotabato City’s main commercial district.
Kadil and Manguda, a foreign-trained jihadist, are identified with rebel commanders operating in Kabuntalan, Maguindanao.
The kidnappers, wearing Army combat uniforms and armed with assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades, barged into Tay’s store, disarmed the security guard, and forced him into a Blue Hyundai van, which was later found abandoned in a riverside village in nearby Sultan Kudarat, Maguindanao.
Aradanas said Tay and his captors were spotted by MILF forces somewhere in Kabuntalan Monday night.
Aradanas said the government-MILF joint ceasefire committee is now helping the 603rd IB and its units track down the kidnappers.
“So far there has been no undue encounter between pursuing soldiers and MILF forces in areas where we are searching for Mr. Tay. The MILF is cooperating with us,” Aradanas said.
Aradanas, however, said they are disturbed by witnesses’ accounts that some of Tay’s kidnappers were armed with B-40 anti-tank rockets, a signature weapon of the MILF.
Cotabato City Mayor Japal Guiani said they have enlisted the help of the Islamic community in working out the release of Tay without ransom.
Sources from the Chinese-Filipino business community said Tay’s immediate relatives have not received any demand yet from the kidnappers.
“That’s an indication that they are still on the run,” Aradanas said.