THE grandmother of two girls abducted by their father is vowing to fight for their custody - and has mounted a hunt within the family to find out who knows their whereabouts.
Mary Douglas told the Bay of Plenty Times she does not know where her son Jamahl Schou has taken
his two daughters but desperately wants any family member who does to come forward.
Schou snatched the girls from the custody of Child Youth and Family in Brookfield last Wednesday - sparking a major police manhunt.
Police believe there are family members who know where Schou and the two girls are. The girls are aged five and six.
Mrs Douglas said she would like to know exactly who police were referring to so she could speak to them.
She wants to take care of her granddaughters when they are found and was today attending a tangi in Opotiki where she hopes to unearth any information that family members may be harbouring the trio.
"Hopefully I can get a couple of leads from down there," she said.
Mrs Douglas says while she does not fear for the girls' safety, she hopes they are not frightened by the experience and "just wants to see her mokos (mokopuna, grandchildren)".
She described her granddaughters - who should have been back at school on Monday - as confident, open and chatty.
"I would guess they would have no idea there's something going on. I'm hoping that they're not scared," she said.
Mrs Douglas said her son and the mother of the two girls had a stormy relationship in the past but "now that they're apart they actually work together for the benefit of the girls".
She said she had a "really good" relationship with the mother but it was her son who had played a more hands-on parenting role.
"He changed the girls from the annexe. He was just a loving Dad, I guess you'd call it," she said. "My grandbabies love their Dad."
Mrs Douglas said the family was shocked and angered by Schou's decision to snatch the girls from their CYF caregiver after a chance meeting at the Brookfield Shopping Centre.
"They're shocked. My sisters were absolutely gob-smacked when they read the paper," she said.
Mrs Douglas said she had a close relationship with her granddaughters and felt they would be asking for her, their mother and other members of the extended family.
"They're definitely asking for me. I can feel them," she said.
This was not the first time her son had gone missing.
"Jamahl actually disappeared on me for eight years before I was able to track him down," she said. He eventually returned to the region in December 1998 after a South Island probation officer linked him to Tauranga.
Mrs Douglas said most of his friends would not know Schou as "Jamahl" as he had been nicknamed "The Driver" by friends because he did not drink or take drugs and was often designated driver if they were going out.
Mrs Douglas is no stranger to family turmoil. She said her cousin was Raymond Ratima, who killed seven people including his three children in Masterton in 1992.