A Filipino engineer kidnapped in Nigeria has been released by his captors but a Filipina earlier reported to have been abducted had apparently left the African country and was now back in the country but has remained missing, the Department of Foreign Affairs said.
Nevertheless, the DFA said Friday that it considered both cases closed.
Instrumentation engineer Winston Helera, who was kidnapped February 6, was released Thursday, DFA undersecretary for migrant workers affairs Esteban Conejos said at a press conference.
�He is now in the clinic of his employer, Shell Petroleum Development Corp., for a physical checkup,� Conejos said. �He is well and in good condition. He will be briefed by our Assistance to Nationals official and will soon be reunited with his family.�
Helera was nabbed about a week after a cargo ship and its whole 24-man Filipino crew was seized. The seamen were freed late last month.
However, the case of Josiebeth Foroozan, a businesswoman married to an Iranian, is more complicated.
Conejos said Foroozan, who disappeared a day after Helera was seized, had not been kidnapped but had actually left Nigeria and has been in the Philippines for almost a month now.
�Her case is not a kidnapping case,� Conejos said. �After 30 days of the alleged kidnapping, nobody has come forward to claim the kidnapping or make demands for her release. But now we have documentary evidence that she left Lagos to Frankfurt on the day of her disappearance and arrived in the Philippines on February 10 on board Lufthansa Flight 778.�
The DFA official said that aside from the passenger manifest from Lufthansa, Foroozan�s arrival in the country was confirmed by arrival records of the Bureau of Immigration and Deportation.
Aside from her husband, Foroozan left a daughter and a son, both in their teens, in Nigeria.
However, Conjeos said Foroozan�s family in the Philippines told him they have not heard from her.
�She is now a missing persons case. She is not abroad and she is not in distress — the two conditions that make her case fall under our jurisdiction. As far as the department is concerned, the case is closed. We are turning over her case to the National Bureau of Investigation to establish her whereabouts and to find out what really happened,� he said.
Conejos said the last communication on Foroozan�s alleged kidnapping came from the Filipina herself.
�She texted her husband from her cell phone. That was the last heard of her and her alleged kidnapping,� he said.
Helera�s wife, mother, sister, brother, and two daughters, who also attended the press conference, thanked the department for his safe release.
Conejos said the Philippine government did not pay any ransom for Helera�s release.
Asked if Helera�s employer did, the DFA official said: �I am not in a position to respond to that question. But I can say that the employer does not deal directly with the kidnappers.�
�The host government which has jurisdiction of the case takes full responsibility for the safe release of the hostages; it is involved in the actual negotiations and would know the terms and timing of the negotiations,� he explained.
Asked if the current deployment ban to Nigeria would be lifted now that all kidnapping cases involving Filipinos have been resolved, Conejos said the DFA and the labor department, which will make the final decision on the deployment of workers to the African nation, would have to discuss the security situation.