Abu Sayyaf Abduct 10 Fishermen!! ESSCOM Sleeping On The Job !

• 10 fishermen in Sabah waters in early morning hours abducted by Abu Sayyaf
• in two fishing boats in Lahad Datu's Tambisan around 2am 
• they were hijacked by heavily armed gunmen
• Tambisan close to Tawi Tawi chain in southern Philippines
• gunmen fled towards Sitangkai in two speedboats
• Sabah Police confirmed kidnapping incident

My comments : Whether they broke the curfew or not is besides the point. 

Looks like the Abu Sayyaf were also breaking the curfew. 

What was ESSCOM doing?

How can the Abu Sayyaf just waltz into our waters and kidnap 10 people?

Especially during curfew hours? 

Where is ESSCOM? 

Who is in charge of enforcing the curfew? 

This is more alarming because just about a week ago the IGP had already warned that the Abu Sayyaf were still a threat. Here is the IGP :

threat of Abu Sayyaf on eastern Sabah still high despite Esscom said IGP

He said attacks can happen every day, at any time.

Esscom will be restructured on the placement of security forces 

involving Armed Forces (MAF), police, Maritime Agency (MMEA)

restructuring will involve structure of security in the areas 

change of security posts, taken over by police and MAF

restructuring being carried out via NSC 

threats to Sabah always there every day

Sabah is very near to Philippines

only 15 minutes by speed boat  

easy for Abu Sayyaf to intrude 

Esscom needs to be alert for any threats 

May 6, Mat Sabu announced Esscom would be restructured 

NSC discussing to acquire additional equipment 

- Bernama

My comments : Ever since Lahad Datu, eastern Sabah has been practically shut down - causing huge economic losses.  Eastern towns like Sandakan, Tawau, Semporna, Lahad Datu have all suffered losses in trade and tourism.

ESSCOM  has to work smarter and harder rather than take a simplistic approach and just shut the place down.

And despite doing that, today 10 people have been abducted again. This is not good.

There needs to be more diligence, transparency and much better use of men, equipment and resources to solve this problem. It is not an insurmountable problem. The NSC (National Security Council) needs to be more on the ball.

After Lahad Datu and the setting up of ESSCOM, I heard news from Sabah that local people can say what time a patrol boat will go out, how far the boat will go out, and when the patrol boat will return to base.  All this was known to local people. The Abu Sayyaf would know it too.

Whatever is done to fight this problem PLEASE DO NOT SHUT DOWN trade and tourism in eastern Sabah.  

The  trade between Sabah and the southern Philippines is believed to be about RM1 BILLION a year. Or more.  This amount of business has since been seriously diminished by the ESCCOM shut down of the east coast of Sabah.

(This is also why the Ringgit has crashed - these are all contributing factors.)

I think people are not serious about tackling this issue.  Especially the National Security Council. They seem to think in terms of spending more and more money. 

What happened to that old oil platform that was converted into a patrol boat base? For a few hundred million Ringgit? Do you need another one?