Island family’s heartfelt plea for fugitive

Press, 1 May 1978, Page 1

Island family’s heartfelt plea for fugitive

PA Invercargill “Who would blame her for wanting to stay? I dare not. Who would ask her to leave? I won’t.” With these words, the Stewart Island family which best knows Kei Agatsuma yesterday summed up their respect and admiration for the Japanese woman who was taken off the island last week.

In a poignant message to the “Southland Times,” the Te Aika family, which farms at Mason Bay, where Mrs Agatsuma spent much of her time, spoke highly of the woman they had come to know as their friend. It said: “Kei Agatsuma, our friend, is a lady to whom dignity and honour are not strangers, and who was brought up in the true Japanese tradition —courteous, generous, very proud. Any help given Kei was returned with interest. “Kei’s world in latter years was a one-roomed ipartment in a block of similar apartments set in the heart of a concrete jungle — a setting for heartache and disillusion.

“The things we take for granted: our bush, birds, animals domestic and wild, the living seas, beaches, streams, stars, sunsets, wind, rain — things we as New Zealanders accept as our natural right to have, to hold, to walk, to feel, to see and enjoy — provide the attraction which drew Kei here and held her.

“Who would blame her for wanting to stay? I dare not. Who would ask her to leave? I won’t. Let the laws of our land be servants unto us, not masters. “You may ask where and how she lived on this island.

“I say, wherever she lived, it was with deep personal dignity, and her appreciation of our land and our natural heritage has left all of those who came to know the true person that is Kei Agatsuma with a sense of gratitude and indebtedness.” said the letter.

The Te Aika family identified themselves as Tim and Ngaire Te Aika and their daughters, Lynette and Wendy. A Japanese Embassy official in Wellington said last evening that the Embassy was trying to trace Mrs Agatsuma’s background, and would help her as much as possible.

She will appear in the Magistrate’s Court at Invercargill today, charged with overstaying a 30-day visitor’s permit.

Mr Kiyoshi Ito, First Secretary at the Embassy, said that the Japanese Consul in Christchurch telephoned Mrs Agatsuma on Friday and Mr Ito then cabled Tokyo to find out more about her. He does not expect to receive any information about her until tomorrow. However, he hoped that a relative or friend may be able to come to New Zealand to escort her home if she is deported, or advise her if she is in some trouble in Japan. He said he was also trying to find Japanese persons in Dunedin who could communicate with Mrs Agatsuma in the meantime. “She may be distressed and upset, and in that case it is better that some persons accompany her,” said Mr Ito. An interpreter has been found to assist Mrs Agatsuma when she appears in Court today. The interpreter, a nationalised Japanese woman now living in Dunedin, was found on Saturdav afternoon.