'Dead grand mum' helped me survive captivity

An Emirati businessman who was kidnapped for two months in Nigeria before he was freed last week said he managed to overcome his ordeal in captivity by remembering his dead grand mother who had stood her illness for years.

Mohammed Khamis Major said he was snatched by captors just after he arrived at the airport and was on his way to the hotel, where he was to stay for a few days to sign a $900,000 deal for buildings maintenance.

Quoted by the Dubai-based Arabic language daily Emirat Alyoum, said he said the Nigerian kidnappers had locked him up in a chicken coop and that he was forced to eat local food he never had before.

Mohammed, who spoke from his room at an Abu Dhabi hospital where he is recuperating, said he had spent very difficult time in captivity and that there were no water and toilet facilities where he was held.

“I spent most of my time in praying and reading the Koran…I had always prayed to God the Almighty to allow me to return home safe…I had not lost hope for a single moment because I strongly believe that life and death are in the hands of our Lord…I was also convinced that my country will never abandon me and that it is doing its best to free me and that’s what happened,” he said.

“The most important thing that enabled me to overcome my ordeal during capacity was that I never stopped remembering my dead grand mother….she had suffered from blindness and paralysis for many years and I took her an example of patience and strength…she was a strong motivation for me.”

Mohammed said that he noticed the captors became “very tense” just two days before he was freed by a joint UAE-Nigeria force.

“I noticed they started to speak to each other nervously and were uttering the word ‘police’ many times…I then realized that time of salvation has come and that’s what happened….some hours later, I was a free man again.”

Mohammed said he was grateful for the efforts exerted by the UAE and its leadership to free him, mainly by Deputy premier and Interior Minister Lt General Sheikh Saif bin Zayed Al Nahyan, who was the first to greet him on his return.