Six suspects, four posing as customers, kidnapped Rolando del Torchio in a swift raid that shocked the dinnertime crowd at his pizzeria in the sleepy port city of Dipolog yesterday, a regional military spokesman said.
The group bundled the 56-year-old into a waiting van then sped off to Manukan town some 50 kilometres away, where they transferred to a motorboat, Captain Roy Vincent Trinidad told AFP.
Navy ships have been alerted to intercept the bandits after intelligence indicated the boat had navigated along the Zamboanga peninsula coastline towards the southwestern island of Jolo, some 400 kilometres away, he added.
"All kidnappings in the peninsula end up in Jolo. That's the pattern," Trinidad said.
"Hostages taken in the area are eventually turned over to the Abu Sayyaf."
The rag-tag Abu Sayyaf has engaged in frequent kidnappings of locals as well foreigners in often successful efforts to extort ransoms.
A Filipino village chief who was seized from the same southwestern peninsula in May was found beheaded on a Jolo highway three months later after the government refused to pay.
Yesterday's incident was the second abduction involving foreigners in the south in less than a month, after the military said Abu Sayyaf is holding foreigners hostage in the Jolo jungles: a Dutch man, a Korean and two Malaysians.
Local press have also reported four foreigners abducted from a luxury island resort in the south Philippines last month -- two Canadians, a Norwegian and a Filipina -- are being held on the island, although authorities have not confirmed this.