Six of the nine — Perfecto Narciso, deck officer; Juliun Nidera, third officer; and Meynard Garcia, Nelson Gipulla, Ronnie Mendoza and Alex Genanda — came home at around 5:30 p.m. Saturday.
Three others, who remained unidentified, arrived at around 8:30 p.m.
All the seamen came home visibly traumatized by their harrowing experience.
The seamen were unloading cargo from the United Arab Emirates-registered M/T LIN 1 at a Somali port when Somalian bandits seized the ship last March 29.
Nidera said the Somali bandits sneaked into their boat from speedboats, and with high-powered rifles declared that they were seizing the oil tanker.
The remaining crewmen, including M/T LIN 1’s Filipino captain Pablo Buaya, are expected to fly home this weekend.
Those who came in Saturday tried to avoid the media and stepped off the plane separately to elude reporters.
Narciso, however, was approached by waiting Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA) officers, and identified by media as one of the returning seamen from M/T LIN 1.
Narciso pointed to Nidera as one of his crewmen on the M/T LIN 1, owned by the Akron Trade and Transport Co. based in Fujairah, UAE.
Nidera said that they had wanted to avoid publicity and go straight home from the airport.
"I wanted to go straight home to Sucat, Parañaque where my wife and eight-year-old son are waiting," he said.
Nidera said that their Somali kidnappers had taken all their belongings and valuables.
"Walang iniwan sa akin," he said. "Lahat ng pera ko at kagamitan, inubos nila lahat yun."
In an interview with reporters, Nidera and Narciso shared that the Somali abductors were rough people who were dead-set on extracting ransom for their release.
"They would make us call our families and say that we were being starved and maltreated, " Narciso said in Filipino. "They really wanted money for our release."
Narciso, 53, married, and a father of two, said they do not know if ransom was paid for their freedom.
It was learned that the owner of M/T LIN 1 negotiated with the Somali bandits to secure the seamen’s release.
Asked if he would still work overseas, Nidera said he had no other option since seafaring was his profession.
"Of course, I have to," he said. "It is my profession. But Somalia, I don’t want to see that place anymore even in my dreams."
Narciso said the ship owner paid them their salaries for the time that they were held hostage in Somalia.
"We were paid in full for the time when we were held hostage," he said.
Nidera said the most frightening moment during their captivity was during the second day when the bandits demanded that the ship’s vault be opened and discovered that there was no money in it.
"Natakot kami nung pilit kunin yung mga gamit namin," he said, adding their lives were threatened if they did not give the bandits their possessions. "Sabi nung isa papatayin kami pag hindi namin ibigay lahat ang pera at gamit namin."
The kidnapers went wild after seeing that there was no money in the vault, he added.
Nidera said the bandits then ordered the crew to hand over all their money and valuables, and started to treat them well only after they parted with their belongings.
"Mabait naman sila sa amin at hindi kami sinasaktan," he said, surmising it was just the bandits’ style to threaten their kin and employers. Style lang nung mga kidnappers iyon para takutin yung opisina at pamilya namin." — Rainier Allan Ronda