Al-Qalam 
[CCTV footage at the Mall of Africa in Johannesburg on December 29 shows the last time Abdella Abadigga was seen]
By Nabeelah Shaikh
Durban businessman Farhad Hoomer, who was previously fingered as a terror suspect, says he fears for his life and now has to move around with a full-time armed bodyguard.
This comes after the abduction of Abdella Hussein Abadiga, an Ethiopian national, who was kidnapped from the Mall of Africa on December 29.
Hoomer, along with Abadiga, were placed under U.S Treasury sanctions with Tanzanian Peter Charles Mbaga and South African Siraaj Miller, in March last year.
The U.S Department of Treasury claims Abadiga has recruited young men in South Africa and sent them to a weapons training camp. They claim he was funding Islamic State (ISIS) activities in Africa. Hoomer was flagged by the U.S Treasury after it claimed that between 2017 and 2018, he helped organise and begin the operations of a Durban-based ISIS cell – and has provided some of his known residential properties and vehicles registered in his name to sponsor the cell’s meetings and operational activities.
At the time, a U.S Treasury statement read: “In his role, Hoomer claimed to have recruited and trained cell members and was in contact with members of ISIS-Democratic Republic of the Congo and ISIS supporters throughout South Africa. Hoomer raised funds through kidnap-for-ransom operations and extortion of major businesses, which provided more than one million South African rand in revenue for his cell, in 2018.”
In October 2018, Hoomer and 11 others were arrested on terrorism-related charges linked to the planting of a number of incendiary devices at various locations in and around Durban, including Woolworths stores. They also faced charges linked to a fatal attack at the Imam Hussain mosque in Verulam, KwaZulu-Natal, which claimed the life of Abbas Essop, in May 2018.
After almost two years of delays with the case, and the state not being ready to proceed with trial, the matter was struck off the court roll in July 2020.
Hoomer told Al-Qalam: “My biggest fear after Abadiga’s kidnapping is that I could be next. There’s a pattern of people being abducted on the same list that I am on. I have also been made aware that Peter Charles Mbaga, the Tanzanian national that was placed on the list, has been missing for about five months now.”
Hoomer claims he didn’t have any links to Abadiga, but the family got in touch with him recently, after Abadiga was kidnapped.
“They got in touch with me because they knew we were all on the same sanctions list, and they wanted to probe whether or not I had any knowledge of what could have happened to him. Or whether I too, was being targeted,” said Hoomer.
Hoomer, who travels frequently for business, says he is still being followed around by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
“They’ve been following me, I’ve seen them a few times but none have actually approached me recently. It’s easy to see when someone is following you. They’re not as smart as they think they are. You see the same people three or four times, and me seeing the same people during my travels, is just very suspicious.
At the moment I’ve got a bodyguard and it’s costing me a lot of money. That’s now my life. I only got the bodyguard after Abadiga was abducted. My family insisted that I get an armed bodyguard after Abadiga’s kidnapping. I need to know what happened to him, because whatever happened to him, could happen to me,” says Hoomer.
Hoomer says the big question for him is: are we living in a lawless country?
“Are we living in a banana republic? Nobody wants to be kidnapped and tortured. We have to defend our lives. And this is a right given to every man that we have to defend our lives and our properties. When Muslims are targeted in South African kidnappings, none of their cases get solved. I want the government to come forward and account for all the Muslim people that have been kidnapped, and had to pay hefty ransoms, yet their cases have never been solved,” said Hoomer.
