Indonesia: Kidnapping Children for Ransom · Global Voices
A. Fatih Syuhud

Nobody in Indonesia feels sure as to what motivates the criminals to abduct a child to serve their purpose. One thing is clear this trend is growing and it grows at an alarming pace. The “climax” of such child abduction criminal trend was the release of Raisya, a 4-year-old pre-nursery student yesterday afternoon after being kidnapped for about 9 days in Jakarta.
As the daughter of Ali Said, the head of Indonesian Young Entrepreneurs (HIPMI) group, makes Raisya more fortunate than the other kids in the sense that her case is getting a lot of attention from the media and Indonesian establishment. No less than President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY) himself made a plea to the abductor to release her sooner rather than later.
Many schools has beefed up their security arrangements to prevent repeats of such incidents. That's said, some schools think that they have had done enough. Reports Cheetezz:
Despite widespread calls for a greater focus on school security, some city private schools insist they have already taken  appropriate action to protect their students.
The North Jakarta International School (NJIS), an elite school in Kelapa Gading, for example, says it already has comprehensive security arrangements in place.
The school says it assigns a teacher’s assistant to accompany students home on the school’s bus service.
But he said the school’s responsibilities did not extend to students who were driven home in private cars.
“Parents are fully responsible for the safety of children who are dropped off and picked up by their own driver,” said Ibu Ish, the transportation coordinator at NJIS.
She said the school kept the identity of all private drivers on file and obliged parents to report the hiring of new drivers to the school.
The principal of another elite institution, Gandhi Memorial International School (GMIS), said his school already had a comprehensive security arrangement but had boosted security somewhat in the wake of the kidnapping.
“Of course, schools should not become fortresses … but security and safety is rule number one for our school. How can we educate correctly without safety?” Ashok Pal Singh said Thursday.
“We have everything under surveillance (at our school),” he said,
According to the Jakarta Post, the abductors ask Raisya parents for ransom about IDR 150 million to 700 million. Interestingly, the mastermind of the kidnapping was the husband of Raisya's Quranic teacher meaning that the suspect was a person whom the unfortunate kid knew very well.