October 31, 2016
Te Kooti prayer book back with Rongowhakaata
Gisborne’s mayor Meng Foon says he’d support any move to get back a prayer book belonging to resistance and religious leader Te Kooti Rikirangi.
The book, which is held by the Hawkes Bay Museum, and Te Kooti’s bone kotiate or club from Canterbury Museum were welcomed on to Pahou Marae in Manutuke on Saturday.
They will go on display in a major exhibition of Rongowhakaata taonga which opens at Tairawhiti Museum in December.
Mr Foon says he will talk to Rongowhakaata about their longer term aims for the book.
"If they want it back we can start a bit of a tono to the Hawkes Bay Museum for it because he taonga tuku iho no matau rohe, it is a taonga from our place and it has a special mauri that belongs here and the wairua belongs here," he says.
Any discussion would have to involve not just the museum but Ngati Kahungunu.
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