Leave him alone

Powerless. Terrified. Captive. And yet constantly cheerful.

That is the image of Roland Ullah that came through in glimpses from film clips and stills of the hostages held by Abu Sayyaf bandits. In all the photos I recall, the man smiled nervously and went about the chores of captivity with a heart lighter than the rest.

But Roland is a man disdained by the Fates.

All of the Sipadan hostages were released save for him. Batch after batch, hostages came and went. Roland remained.

By his own account, Roland was kept by the bandits as punishment for a grievous crime: he did not disclose that one of the Sipadan hostages earlier released was a Malaysian policeman. The bandits felt they lost a highly negotiable hostage because the Filipino captive did not squeal.

For that offense, Roland was kept for three years as a virtual slave to the bandits. He performed camp chores and carried the heavy loads through mountain trails. Whenever skirmishes happened, his life was on the line.

Roland was the man everyone conveniently forgot about when the Estrada government trumpeted the release of the Sipadan hostages amid ugly rumors of virtual ransom being paid through government’s own emissaries – despite government’s own no-ransom policy.

Roland was the man everyone forgot when the Dos Palmas hostage drama unfolded with tales of payoffs, flubbed military operations, dramatic rescues and bloody encounters. Gracia Burnham had endured captivity, lost her husband in an intense rescue operation, went home to the States to recover and came back with a controversial book. Through all that time, Roland Ullah carried pots and pans for the bandits.

The military suspected Roland had joined the bandits.

There were many instances when he could have escaped – but did not. No one offered to pay his ransom. Nobody really bothered to locate him and mount a perilous rescue mission for his freedom.

By his account, Roland says the bandits threatened to have his family killed if he dared escape. For that reason, he endured the enslavement to the cruel band that held him. He would rather bear the torments of enslavement rather than imperil his loved ones.

That was until a few days ago, when he managed to escape during a skirmish.

But Roland was not treated as the hero he deserved to be. Instead, his liberty was momentarily curtailed. The military kept him from rushing to his family on the grounds that he had to undergo interrogation and debriefing. The military wanted to be very sure this man was not the enemy.

This man is thoroughly luckless.

Because of doubts about his true sympathies, his community did not welcome him when he was finally allowed to go home. The reception from his own wife and family was tepid. The child he had not seen for three years did not know him.

There were no bands to honor him. A government unsure of what he is or what he has become was reluctant to accord him praise and help him recover from the trauma.

If he were an American, Roland would have been rushed to a medical facility, checked thoroughly for illnesses and counseled by psychiatrists to help him sort out his thoughts. But this Filipino who worked in a Malaysian resort was given no accolade. There was no financial assistance for him nor a medical program prepared for his needs.

He simply trudged home and, by himself, tried to reconcile with his new reality.

The least we could do, I suppose, is to leave him alone. Let’s not bother to strut him about as a prop to glorify policy. Let’s not bother to debrief him any further.

Just leave him alone. Given him the space to pick up the shattered pieces of his life. Give him the peace to deal with his nightmares.

If we are not prepared to console this poor man, let us at least not molest him. Let us not add to the burden of a traumatic experience by treating him with suspicion and subjecting him to all sorts of callous procedures.

We have been sufficiently unjust to this poor man. Let us not add cruelty to all that has already endured.

I sympathize with this man deeply.

I understand that, stripped of everything and threatened with every imaginable dire prospect, he would do what is necessary to survive. He would cooperate with the bastards that point guns at him. He would obey their every whim and undertake every instruction given him.

For three years, this man had no freedom. He was allowed no dignity. He was left with no options. He was debased by his captors, threatened by evil men and mistreated by those who mistreat all of us because of some perverse fanaticism.

And then there is the established psychological phenomenon: hostages, reduced to a dehumanized state, actually begin to love their oppressors.

Roland Ullah is not a complex man. He is a man of simple means and simple thought. But he knows enough to be kind: the other Sipadan hostages hold him in very high regard and are thankful for the small things he has done for them to relieve the pain of captivity in harsh jungle.

Here walks the Filipino Everyman. He takes the worst circumstances in stride. He adapts. He bends. He yields more than a little as his life hung on the barest thread.

This man personifies so many of us in this land where the powerless are forced to accept indecent treatment. Roland Ullah is the face on the mirror that so many of us look at in the morning of yet another dreary day.

If we cannot be kind to this man, let us at least not add to his misery. If we cannot be soothing, let us at least not be ruthless.

I imagine Roland Ullah, like so many of us, lived a life where kindness was scarce. Where comfort was rare. Where charity was not readily forthcoming. Where respect is not usually given. Where love did not generously flow.

And yet he has borne it all with more than a little amount of cheer. He was ready to give comfort even if he received none. He had a ready smile notwithstanding the constant pain.

Leave Roland Ullah in peace. That is the least we can do for someone so much like so many of us.