THE mountains can be inhospitable and a dangerous place for the ill prepared. From one hour to the next, a dramatic variation in weather conditions—from the scorch of the blistering sun to the freezing level of temperatures at night—could put one’s life in peril.
This could be Father Michael “Mick” Sinnott’s inconsolable circumstances at present, Rico Nadala Pamaran said, calling to mind his grueling ordeal in the hands of his captors when he was kidnapped last January, this year.
Speaking for the first time to this paper, Pamaran described in detail his five-month suffering after being snatched by three unidentified persons and taken to a secluded area between Sultan Naga Dimaporo, Lanao del Norte and Sultan Gumander in Lanao del Sur.
It was in the afternoon of January 10, Rico narrates, when he and his close friend, Vernon, went to Tukuran upon invitation of a newfound acquaintance, and after reaching the Serina Beach Resort, three unidentified persons armed with short firearms met them and ordered the two to start driving towards Sultan Naga Dimaporo.
The towns of Tukuran and Aurora, Zamboanga del Sur is just adjacent to Sultan Naga Dimaporo in the western border while farther south of the municipal water is the tip of Illana Bay which reaches the Celebes Sea lane.
Everything was spontaneous, Rico said, he had no time to react or ask questions and wasn’t able to fully grasp the situation. His new friend, the one who invited them and whom he wouldn’t identify, was now gone.
After arriving at the place instructed by the armed men, more faces showed up, exactly five, as Rico recalls, who then ordered the two kidnap victims to board another vehicle and head straight to a coconut farm.
There, nine other people with high powered firearms received the two and directed them to follow on foot. They walked towards a remote, mountainous area.
January 11, Pamaran’s abandoned Suzuki Vitara was recovered by police with its doors open somewhere along the national highway of Kapatagan, Lanao del Norte as news of his absence reached his family and local authorities.
Because of the quandary and with the lack of any personal contact from Rico, his family refused to talk with the local media, who, against better judgment, reported that Rico may have staged his own abduction.
Pamaran added that his family still refused to believe that he was kidnapped until after two months when they were informed by his captors that they have Rico hostage.
“I can say that the kidnapping was well planned and the person responsible only became my friend for only about two months,” Pamaran said.
Picking up on his last recount, Pamaran continued that it was already 8:00 in the evening when they stopped walking on flat soil and started a tedious climb to a hilly area finally arriving at 6:00 early morning the next day.
“I remember we only rested twice for 15 to 20 minutes during that ten-hour hike. We crossed rivers before reaching the place where we stayed for the duration,” Pamaran said.
Eight heavily armed men remained closely with Rico and Vernon the whole time on a rotation basis while a runner who also acted as their guide would come and leave. One of the eight, Rico remembers, was addressed by everybody as “Kumander.” He was there all the time giving orders to his men.
For six months and fourteen days, Rico said he could not describe the hardships he went through in the hands of his kidnappers. All the time they were only staying in one spot and in that hilly place within Lanao del Sur, he was sure.
“All the time we were without rest, we stayed in the open space and slept in a crude hammock made of cloth and using a plastic stuff as shade from the blistering heat of the sun. We also get drenched when it rains and its very cold during evenings, I almost gave up,” Rico said, with tears in his eyes.
For food, he said they frequently eat rice and sardines during the first few weeks and later shifted to dried fish.
The kidnappers were so sensitive they would transfer from one place to another every time they notice the presence of people cutting trees in the area. They move farther away by a kilometer, which takes about 30 minutes in hiking at one time Rico grazed his foot from the pebbles.
“We don’t have any medicine with us so we made use of some grasses around and mixed it with cooking oil for medicine,” he said.
He added that the kidnappers used cellular phones but have difficulty in finding a signal. The runner would then be utilized, who will deliver letters to his waiting family.
Rico also claimed in the same conversation that Vernon was released last June 28. He talked with his friend not to leave him but Vernon insisted that he has to go home first.
It was not known if Vernon really reached home. Recently, this paper learned that Vernon’s mother, appealed to authorities to include her son in the rescue of Mick Sinnott.
July 24, almost a month after Vernon’s freedom, Rico was aroused from his sleep and told that he will see liberty that day. He was then accompanied all the way downhill to a highway near Sultan Naga Dimaporo where a vehicle was waiting.
There, a man who presented himself as the “negotiator,” met him and drove Rico to his residence in San Pedro, Pagadian City. This negotiator, according to Rico, was an ex-mayor of one of the towns in Basilan. A police source said the Pamaran family paid P5 million for Rico’s freedom.
As for Sinnot, the kidnapped Irish priest, is reportedly now in the hands of Moro rebel commander Latip Jamat somewhere in the hinterlands of Sultan Naga Dimaporo in Lanao Del Norte, the police said.
November 2, All Souls Day, is the 23rd day of his captivity.
“God continues to use Father Mick to bring many people prayerfully together. As he enters his 23rd night of captivity let us, as part of this ‘prayer community’, continue to pray with and for him: ‘I waited, I waited for the Lord and he stooped down to me; he heard my cry’ [Ps.40],” Sinnott’s superior, Fr. Patrick O’Donoghue, went in his reflection posted in one of the Columban Fathers’ blogs.
REPORT BY JONG CADION & MICHAEL MEDINA