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Kidnapped TV host claims she was betrayed

A television presenter freed after being held hostage nine days by Muslim militants in the Philippines said yesterday that she was betrayed by someone who delivered her to the kidnappers.

In her first interviews since she was released, a tearful Cecilia “Ces” Drilon, an anchorwoman for ABS-CBN, told reporters of how the Abu Sayyaf militants holding her and three others in her group threatened to behead them.

“We came close to losing our lives,” she said hours after their release.

Drilon, 46, two cameramen and a Muslim academic were abducted on June 8 after arriving in the southern island of Jolo to interview an Abu Sayyaf leader. One of the cameramen was released last week after a ransom was paid.

“There was some betrayal involved and that is why we were kidnapped,” said the presenter, who declined to say who had turned on her.

The mother of four, whose face was scarred by mosquito bites, said her group was tied up and that one of the kidnappers slapped her.

“I thought I was so reckless. I didn’t think of my family who I put through a really terrible ordeal in the past 10 days,” she said.

Sources close to the negotiators said the group was released following talks between the Abu Sayyaf and a prominent politician and Drilon friend, Senator Loren Legarda, who is expected to contest the 2010 presidential election.

Officials said Legarda promised development aid — not ransom — to Jolo.

National police chief Avelino Razon said they would question the freed hostages on who betrayed them and that they were tracking down the kidnappers.

The Abu Sayyaf, a group of militants founded with money provided by Osama bin Laden in the early 1990s, has been blamed for the country’s worst attacks.
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