After 193 days in captivity, Judith Tebbutt, a 57 year old British social worker was set free by her abductors after a ransom of $1 million was dropped by plane in a remote part of Somalia. A further $260,000 was paid to middlemen who negotiated her release.
The Tebbutts were on the first night of a two-week holiday at the $600-a-night Kiwayu Safari Village in Kenya. They were sleeping in a cabin when the kidnappers arrived quietly by sea at 4 am last September. David Tebbutt 58, put up a fight and died after he was shot in the chest. His wife was forced onto a waiting speedboat and in half an hour they were in Somali waters, only 30 miles away.
The pirates then sold Mrs Tebbutt for $400,000 to another militia group a fortnight later. They allowed her to make frequent phone calls home to make it easier to raise a ransom from her family. In a video she recorded shortly before her release she said she was in good health and was well cared for. “I feel fine. I have had absolutely no torture whatsoever. In fact I have been made to feel as comfortable as possible by the pirates that are holding me.”
Her only child, Oliver, was responsible for covert negotiations with the pirates and he arranged for the ransom to be parachuted from a light aircraft on Tuesday. His mother was taken to a spot in the desert where she was picked up, driven to the nearest police station and escorted to Adado where a small private plane was waiting.
It’s now clear that kidnapping Western hostages is a lucrative source of income for Somali pirates. Governments won’t pay ransoms for private citizens but families will and their treachery in this instance, and many others, has paid off very well. Anyone thinking about taking a Safari holiday in Africa any time soon, might like to think again.
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