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THE gun was centimetres from his head. The next few seconds would bring one of two things - life or death.
In those horrifying moments, time seemed to stretch.
'I thought of my family, especially my elderly parents. I regretted not saying goodbye to them before leaving for Jordan,' said Mr Tan.
He pleaded with the men not to harm him.
Mr Tan did not want us to use his real name as he still fears for his safety.
Staring at the barrel of a gun was not the only ordeal he suffered during his six days in captivity in the Middle-Eastern country.
Mr Tan, 26, was twice beaten mercilessly and given only one meal a day throughout.
It has been eight months since he and the CEO of the company he was working for were kidnapped.
Mr Tan, who resigned from the company after the incident, said he did not know what had happened to the CEO, an Indian national based in Singapore.
He would not give us any details, not even the name of the company, but said the CEO had transferred some money, apparently as demanded by the kidnappers.
He and the CEO were in Jordan to seal a petroleum deal that was said to be worth $11 million.
On 17 Oct last year, they were told to meet some Jordanian men at a farm on the outskirts of the capital, Amman, for dinner.
A driver and an escort met them at 9.30pm and drove them to a deserted house near the Syrian border.
The first hint of trouble came when Mr Tan said they saw 'eight or nine face-covered guards standing outside the house with guns'.
When they were led into the house, they saw two more masked gunmen.
Mr Tan said: 'I sensed something was wrong when we were directed into a bedroom with ropes and chains placed nicely on the bed. When I turned to one of the masked men, I was hit on the head and pulled to another room.'
And when a gun was pointed to his head, he thought he would be shot.
He said: 'I was afraid and disappointed that I would not make it to Singapore.'
His captor later forced him to strip and empty his pockets.
His mobile phone was confiscated and the SIM card and battery removed fromit.
His captors recorded the incident on a video camera.
BEGGING & SHOUTING
Mr Tan said: 'The kidnappers asked me if I'm his (employer's) partner. I said no and told them I was new in the company. They checked with my boss and found that I was telling the truth.'
Mr Tan said he had been working for the Singapore-based oil company for 10months And fortunately, it was his 'inexperience' in the company which saved him from more physical torture by his captors.
His boss, who was held in the next room, was not so lucky.
'All I heard was shouting and begging from the next room,' Mr Tan said. 'I heard the kidnappers saying something like they wanted their money back.'
He added that he was not sure why they were held captive, though he suspected it might have had something to do with the deal that they were negotiating.
All this was a far cry from the wonderful reception Mr Tan and his boss had received when they arrived in Jordan on 13 Oct last year.
During their two-day trip, they dined at good restaurants and were shown tourist attractions in Amman.
The meeting was good and everything seemed 'on track' for their deal, which concerned an oil project in Nigeria.
They returned to Singapore, only to be told that they had to go to Jordan again the next day because the deal was ready for them to sign.
And it is on this trip that they were bundled off to the farm where they were held for three days.
Mr Tan said he was kept locked in a room. Once, he was hit with a stick because a guard thought he had gone to the toilet without permission.
He said: 'Only dinner and water was served every day. For three days, I could hear begging, shouting and torturing noises coming from the next room.
'I kept hoping, when they told me that I was going back that night. But of course, they lied.'
On 20 Oct, they were driven out of the farmhouse and taken to an office in Amman, where Mr Tan understood his boss transferred an undisclosed amount of money via the Internet.
They were told they would be released soon after, but that's not what happened.
Instead, they were then taken to a hotel suite, which was guarded by two armed men.
There, Mr Tan's boss saw an opportunity to escape because the guards were 'lenient and were watching television' in the living room.
Mr Tan said: 'My boss told me they will not release us even if they get the money. They will either kill us or frame us with drugs.'
His boss felt that as Mr Tan had done National Service, he could try to overpower the guards and take their guns.
DASHED OUT
He did not try that, but when the guards were elsewhere in the suite, they dashed out.
At the reception downstairs, Mr Tan said his boss created a scene, telling the staff to call the police as they had been kidnapped.
Unfortunately, the men's captors realised what had happened and angrily took them back to the room. They also forced them to call the reception and say that it was all a misunderstanding.
The next day, while their captors were busy preparing dinner, Mr Tan said his boss managed to make a secret phone call to his wife, who was then in Singapore.
She was told to inform the authorities here.
Soon after that, Mr Tan was separated from his employer, and taken away.
He said he had never seen his boss since then.
Mr Tan was then taken to another hotel in Amman, where he stayed two more nights.
The captors showed him an air ticket and passport, and said he was scheduled to leave at 1.50am on 23Oct.
But the flight was to London, not Singapore.
He said the men handed him his passport, air ticket and US$500 ($760) just before he left.
Once he was in London, Mr Tan said he contacted his CEO's wife and the authorities here.
They told him to return to Singapore immediately on a flight through Dubai.
But Mr Tan didn't do this.
'At the airport, I decided to buy a Singapore Airlines ticket direct to Singapore, which I felt was safer,' he said.
It was a bitter experience, said Mr Tan.
His advice to other Singaporeans: Do your homework before deciding to do business overseas.
In a phone interview, he said: 'I wanted to forget the whole experience. I was so traumatised that I immediately resigned from the company when I returned to Singapore.
'When doing business deals with foreigners, Singaporeans must first do a background check.
'I think all this happened because we were too trusting.'
Mr Tan has since lodged a report with the Singapore police.
A Singapore police spokesman confirmed that Mr Tan had made a report and said they had looked into the matter.
'After careful consideration of the facts and circumstances of the case, and in consultation with the Attorney-General's Chambers, police are taking no action,' the spokesman said.
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MFA: S'porean asked for help
THE Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed that Mr Tan had sought help and that he was later provided consular assistance.
A spokesman from the Singapore Consulate in Amman said it had tracked down Mr Tan and was in touch with him during the period he claimed he was detained.
Said Madam Raida, assistant to Singapore Honorary Consul-General, George Haddad: 'When I spoke to him (Mr Tan), he had told me not to worry and that he was fine.
'This is the first time we have come across an incident like this in Amman. And since he said he was fine then, no police report was made in Amman.'
But Mr Tan said that when he spoke to the consulate, he had the guards next to him in the hotel room, and therefore could not convey the real situation.
Source: newspaper |
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