EDITORIAL - Another kidnapping

Just over a month after a Chinese student of the British School Manila was kidnapped and had one of his fingers mutilated, a businessman was also reportedly kidnapped for ransom.

The businessman, said to be a Chinese-Filipino, was reportedly kidnapped in Bulacan. The Filipino-Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry Inc., the biggest Tsinoy business organization, released a statement expressing concern over the kidnapping.

Last Tuesday morning, members of the police Highway Patrol Group found a Lexus LM350 multipurpose vehicle abandoned in Barangay Bahay Toro in Quezon City. The HPG said the luxury vehicle belongs to a businessman in Valenzuela who was kidnapped on March 29. Residents said two men wearing hoodies left the vehicle in the afternoon of the same day along Seminary Road. The next day, the businessman’s relatives reportedly received a call from someone demanding a multimillion-dollar ransom.

The Filipino-Chinese federation had earlier downplayed as an isolated incident the kidnapping of the 14-year-old boy outside the school in Taguig on Feb. 20. His Filipino driver was reportedly killed the next day. On Feb. 26, the boy was found abandoned along Macapagal Avenue in Parañaque.

Police probers said those behind the boy’s kidnapping were Chinese nationals like the victim. This information has yet to be established because no suspect has been arrested. Also needing verification is the announcement of government officials that no ransom was paid, although $20 million was initially demanded, according to reports. The amount was said to have been whittled down to $1 million.

And it doesn’t matter if both the victim and perpetrators were Chinese citizens. Anyone who breaks the law in the Philippines must be caught and punished.

As in other offenses, failure to catch perpetrators can invite a repeat, or encourage others to commit similar crimes. This is true particularly in crimes that pay handsomely, such as drug trafficking, bank robbery, carjacking and, yes, kidnapping for ransom. At the height of the notoriety of the Abu Sayyaf, ransom kidnapping became the top cottage industry in Basilan and Sulu.

With the kidnappers of the boy still at large, it’s not surprising that another person has been kidnapped for ransom. The perpetrators may not belong to the same gang, but failure to arrest the kidnappers of the boy is likely to have emboldened those behind the second case.

It has been nearly three decades since the kidnapping spree that targeted mainly members of the Tsinoy community. Cooperation of the community with law enforcement agencies and an ensuing bloody police crackdown on organized kidnapping rings eventually put an end to the scourge.

Late yesterday, police were verifying if two men found dead in Rizal are the kidnapped businessman and his driver. This scourge must be nipped in the bud, ASAP.