The only way you can get Abu Sayyaf terrorists to release their hostages is to show them the money. The government realized this ages ago, but its problem is how to camouflage the payoff so it won't look like a ransom payment, like the "board and lodging" fees paid in the past for the group's prominent hostages.
For one, it doesn't look good when a government appears to be capitulating to terrorists' demands. For another, money for the payoff will be sourced from abroad, so the government must also make it appear that Philippine sovereignty won't be compromised, that foreigners won't be perceived to be meddling in internal affairs.
There's a plan to use money from the foundation of Libyan strongman Moamar Gadhafi for "livelihood assistance" to children and other relatives of Abu Sayyaf members. It won't be the first time that the Abu Sayyaf will be getting assistance from Libya, known to be a sponsor of international terrorism. European Union representatives, including those whose citizens are among the Abu Sayyaf's captives, are also ready to commit additional aid to Mindanao, particularly in the Muslim enclaves.
Government officials are taking pains to emphasize that such forms of assistance do not constitute ransom. But whatever you call it, no one will dispute that the "assistance" is being dangled before the Abu Sayyaf as a result of its two major hostage capers in Basilan and Sulu. So does kidnapping pay or not?
More than giving the ransom payment a cloak of respectability, the government's problem is how to end the culture of extortion that this hostage incident has bred. The Abu Sayyaf has been engaged in various forms of extortion since the group's creation nearly a decade ago, from ransom kidnapping to outright shakedown. But the extortion reached new heights (or sank to new lows) with the abduction of those 19 foreigners plus two Filipinos from the Malaysian island of Sipadan.
Just take a look at the ecstatic face of Ghalib Andang, a.k.a. Commander Robot, ubiquitous in newspaper photographs and video footages, and you can tell that the terrorists are relishing their 15 minutes of infamy. (Fifteen minutes? More like 15 years.) They got Robin Padilla, 200 sacks of rice, a procession of foreign representatives wanting to meet with them, plus all the publicity they want. All because they snatched foreigners and school children.
You can't dismiss Abu Sayyaf terrorists as rebels without a cause. They do have a vision -- of Islamic fundamentalism spreading across the globe. First Sulu and Basilan. Then the entire country. And on to the rest of the world.
But that could take another millennium to achieve. In the meantime, there's a fundamentalist movement to sustain, women and children to feed, supporters to pay off so they'll see your group as the Mindanao version of Robin Hood.
Apart from demanding ransom for their hostages, the Abu Sayyaf has been collecting fees from journalists for interviews, even robbing them outright. Sure, no terrorist's gun is pointed to a journalist's head when he is "asked" for his wristwatch and instamatic camera. But what would happen if the journalist refused?
With the Abu Sayyaf still holding 29 hostages, I guess the government has no choice but to make noises about offering a "political package" together with the financial "assistance" demanded by the terrorists. But the Abu Sayyaf won't settle for autonomy, and it surely doesn't want to be assimilated into Nur Misuari's fiefdom.
When this is all over, only a fool will bother to discuss anything political with this group. Remember what Abu Sayyaf members did to their captive priest and teachers. Remember their massacre of 15 Christian teachers in Basilan, their pillage of Ipil town, their rape of kidnap victims. I find it hard to believe that Islam, one of the world's great religions, would sanction such inhuman acts.
The Abu Sayyaf is a band of mentally unstable criminals, plain and simple. If they can't be hauled to the lethal injection chamber after this sorry episode, they should be annihilated on the spot. Letting them get away with this hostage caper, and allowing them to keep whatever money they can squeeze out of it, will only encourage more abductions -- in Mindanao, in neighboring Malaysia, even in Metro Manila.
No one will be safe.
Now take time out from Mindanao, politics and the shrinking peso, and take a look at the June 5 issue of Newsweek. Not for Malacañang's reaction (in the Letters section) to the magazine's recent unflattering cover story on President Erap, but for an article that floored me: 78-year-old Helen Gurley Brown wrote about having sex with her 83-year-old husband. She even posed for the article in a mini skirt and fishnet stockings.
I am just as flabbergasted by my reaction to the article. In this land of male chauvinists, it is not uncommon to hear of 83-year-old men having sex, even without Viagra. But a 78-year-old woman? All along I thought I was this shock-proof, jaded liberal. So why do I find it so incredible that a woman is writing about enjoying sex in her late 70s? I loved that final chapter in Gabriel Garcia Marquez's Love in the Time of Cholera, didn't I? But that was magic realism, a work of fiction; Brown is for real!
"Sex is one of the three best things there are, and I don't know what the other two are," Brown wrote. "Sex keeps you connected to the human race, prevents you from being a prim, stuffy, puffy, correct, respected, respectable, finished old person!"
Imagine your grandmother writing those lines. I can't -- neither my paternal grandma nor my maternal lola even reached 75, may they rest in peace. What will the Church say, when sex is supposed to be only for procreation? Seventy-eight is way past menopause, when a woman is supposed to be worrying about osteoporosis and her great-granddaughter becoming a teenage single parent. Looking at a red-hot 78-year-old, I'm more inclined to warn her about a fractured hip bone than to encourage her to go, girl.
But what would I know about septuagenarian women? Each day in this fast-paced world exposes a prejudice that must be overcome. Perhaps by the time I'm 78 -- if I ever reach that age -- geriatric sex will be common, helped by the wonders of science. Hurrah for women, but watch that hip bone. If you can't prolong life or youth, you can at least prolong libido.
I'm going to the gym today. Have to get ready for 78, you know.
BUZZ: Armed Forces Chief of Staff Gen. Angel Reyes knows how to mix business with pleasure. While watching out for "destabilizing" jokes sent via text messaging, he has come up with some of his own. They're not Erap jokes though, but green jokes. He's willing to swap them with those interested. Sample:
Sperm 1 to Sperm 2 (in the tone of AFPCS): Have we reached our target yet?
Sperm 2 to Sperm 1: No, sir, because we have to pass through a long stretch of tonsillitis!