Former kidnap victims Ces Oreña-Drilon and Mindanao State University (MSU) professor Octavio Dinampo found themselves at the opposite sides of the table during the Department of Justice's (DOJ) preliminary hearing of their kidnap case, after Dinampo stood by his statement that Indanan, Sulu mayor Alvarez Isnaji and his son Haider were not involved in the crime.

Dinampo, who recently arrived in the country after coming from Uganda, pleaded emotionally to Drilon to "tell the truth" because she may have been pressured to pinning the Isnajis in the kidnapping.

"I just would like her to contemplate for a while. Of course I know pressures are pressures, that, to be fair to everybody I think she must stand," Dinampo said.

He literally sat at the other side of the table where the hearing was being conducted, beside the Isnajis, who are being linked to the bandit group who kidnapped the professor and the ABS-CBN news team for ten days in the jungles of Sulu.

"Parang nagtataka ako na nandoon siya sa kabilang mesa, so parang nagtatampo ako siyempre. Nagtatampo. Okay, tama na iyon," Drilon said.

In his affidavit, the peace advocate explicitly stated that the Isnajis were not involved in the kidnapping.

Drilon, Angelo Valderama and Jimmy Encarnacion, meanwhile, stood as private complainants against the Isnajis. The ABS-CBN senior correspondent and anchor said they are not being pressured to link the Isnajis.

"Yun din naman ang tanong ko sa kanya eh. Baka siya ang nape-pressure ng mga Isnaji," she said.

The DOJ finished their clarificatory questioning in Monday's session, and the panel is scheduled to resolve the case within a few weeks.

The panel also had a message to ABS-CBN, after it aired the documentary "Kidnap," which used footage taken by the team during their captivity, Sunday night.

"We would like to correct the impression that the panel does not want the document to be shown. We do not want any evidence to be suppressed. Be it noted that it was the lawyers for ABS-CBN who first asked the panel to guarantee that the footage, which was viewed later that afternoon, will not be leaked to media. Give us a chance to give you justice if you want. Do not malign the panel," DOJ prosecutor Atty. Emily delos Santos said.

ABS-CBN, meanwhile, denied it maligned the DOJ by showing the documentary. -- Report from Alex Santos, ABS-CBN News