Letter to the Editor - Thursday August 9, 2012

Gone and forgotten

I am absolutely disgusted by the lack of respect shown by some people in this town to the desecration of graves at Kaitaia cemetery.

This desecration was caused by an old building owned by a church (Abundant Life), and after saying that his church accepted responsibility for the damage Pastor Glen Adair has been very silent and hard to reach.

Councillor Mate Radich also spouted off a whole lot of garbage about "there's money in council for this sort of thing" and threatening to take them to court, and then he washed his hands of the whole thing.

These damaged graves belong to people who helped build this area to what we have today.

I remember our grandfather telling my kids stories of how he worked in the Mangamuka Gorge to build a road using a pick and shovel. Most people these days probably don't even know how to use a pick or shovel, let alone dig a road through a mountain with them.

This is a council-owned cemetery, and the lack of response from Mayor Wayne Brown and Councillor Monty Knight really shows their true colours. Monty said when he sold his business that he wanted to spend more time on council work. Frankly, I have never heard of anything he has done or said concerning council or anything else.

It's not in Kerikeri, and most of the damaged graves are not Maori people, so why would they care? And Wayne Brown didn't "donate" the cemetery, so why would he care? His main concern at the moment is the theft of a wooden seat he donated.

How can FNDC become a unitary authority when they can't even handle the area they already have? Just Wayne Brown's dreams of grandeur.

Then the real Far North would get even less than we do now.

SUE LUNJEVICH

Pamapuria