KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 28 — Siti Aishah Abdul Wahab, who was recently rescued from 30 years of alleged slavery in a Communist collective in London, could not be persuaded by her fellow Malaysians to give up her political beliefs in the 1980s, her acquaintance has said.

Fariddah Ismail Cook, who had studied in the University of London, described Siti Aishah as being “very firm” in her political beliefs.

“I believe at that point in her life, no one could change her mindset and her political views,” Fariddah was quoted as saying by the New Straits Times (NST).

According to Fariddah, she had heard about Siti Aishah from an Indonesian couple working at the university’s School of Oriental and African Studies.

“They tried to persuade her, too. So, whenever I was on my way to lectures, I would engage in a discussion with her. Although she was gentle, passive and not at all aggressive in her approach, she was very firm in her beliefs,” she said in an interview at her house in London.

Fariddah provided a glimpse of Siti Aishah’s activism in the university in the 1980s, depicting the Malaysian as wearing a black Mao jacket while giving out leaflets.

“I know that she was still around in 1981 and 1982. She was always with a group of people - non-Malaysians. I would say that she was very much led and never the leader. While there were others chanting slogans, she was more in the background, distributing leaflets,” she said.

Looking at Siti Aishah’s pictures in newspapers prompted Fariddah to recall an encounter on a “cold winter day” decades ago, where the former was distributing leaflets alone on the steps of the university’s SOAS.

“Our eyes made contact and I was very sad, thinking how she had turned her back on everything to support this ideology in which there is no place for God,” Fariddah said.

According to NST, other Malaysians in London, including the late religious scholar Abu Bakar Hamzah, had also tried to talk to Siti Aishah but failed to get her to leave the Communist collective.

Siti Aishah ignores journalists as she closes the door in ITV News' 1997 news footage. — Picture courtesy of Daily Mail

Yesterday, Malaysia’s Inspector-General of Police confirmed Siti Aishah’s identity, even as UK’s Scotland Yard refused to divulge the identity of the 69-year-old Malaysian victim whom they said was still “traumatised” by her 30-year captivity.

UK newspaper Daily Telegraph had quoted a retired teacher, Kamar Mautum, as saying that she believes the Malaysian victim is her sister named Siti Aishah.

Kamar was reported by the Daily Telegraph as saying that Siti Aishah had studied at one of Malaysia’s most elite schools, eventually winning a Commonwealth scholarship to study surveying in London.

Siti Aishah reportedly moved to Britain in 1968 with her then fiancé, named Omar Munir by the Daily Telegraph, but was soon involved in extremist politics, eventually giving up everything to follow a Maoist doctrine.

The Malaysian victim was one of three women rescued from their two alleged captors — named as India-born Aravindan Balakrishnan and his Tanzanian-Indian wife Chandra Pattni — in a flat in Brixton, south London, on October 25. The other two victims are a 57-year-old Irish woman and a 30-year-old Briton.

Police said the three women were brainwashed and had reported being beaten, but did not appear to have been sexually abused.

Balakrishnan and Pattni, reportedly the leaders of an extreme Maoist collective, were arrested last Thursday for allegedly detaining the three women against their will, but have since been released on bail pending police investigations.

On Tuesday night, Kamar left for London in hopes of being reunited with her long-lost sibling, with the family’s last contact with Siti Aishah said to be in 1982.

NST also reported today that Siti Aishah’s ex-fiance Omar Munir expressed gratitude that she was found.

His daughter Dayana Omar Munir said the 70-year-old professor was shocked by the news and is not ready to meet anyone yet.