EDITORIAL - Remember the Abu Sayyaf hostages?

With a plane crashing into Manila Bay and bombs going off in Zamboanga and Metro Manila, people have nearly forgotten the Abu Sayyaf. The original Islamist faction of the group had been driven out of Basilan during the six-month "Balikatan" war exercises this year between Philippine and American troops. Aldam Tilao, the group’s flamboyant spokesman better known as Abu Sabaya, was reported killed in a sea encounter with government troops assisted by US technology. Sabaya has not surfaced for several months since the reported encounter, so it’s likely that he was indeed turned into shark feed in the waters off the Zamboanga peninsula.

But the group’s chieftain Khadaffy Janjalani reportedly fled Basilan even before Balikatan started. Janjalani is believed to have joined up with the other Abu Sayyaf faction in Sulu, whose members are more notorious for banditry than Islamic zealotry. This faction was responsible for the raid in 2000 on the Malaysian island resort of Sipadan, where the group grabbed foreign hostages.

Last Aug. 20, some members of this faction kidnapped six members of the Jehovah’s Witness who were peddling cosmetics in Patikul town. The two male hostages were decapitated; their heads were found in the Jolo market the next day. The bandits held on to the four women captives: Norie Bendijo, Emely Mantic, and Cleofe and Flora Montulo.

Now the bandits are reportedly demanding P16 million in exchange for the four women as well as three Indonesian sailors who were abducted last June 17 near Capual Island off Jolo. Sulu Gov. Yusop Jikiri said he received the ransom demand through a courier working for bandit leader Radulan Sahiron. Jikiri said Sahiron also promised to end all kidnappings on the island if the P16 million was paid.

The governor rejected the demand. But his revelation should remind the government that the Abu Sayyaf continues to terrorize residents in some of the poorest areas of Mindanao. The revelation should also remind authorities about the plight of the hostages. There are seven people in the hands of a group with a proven track record for ruthlessness. The government is supposed to be cracking down on terror. It should turn its attention to Sulu, where residents have been terrorized for years by a band of brigands called the Abu Sayyaf.