Tribe's ban on kaimoana to continue

Sergeant Kevin Anderson begins a shoreline search for the missing diver at Cable Bay on Thursday, while a Coastguard crew searches just offshore.

A rahui barring fishing or collecting seafood along the Doubtless Bay coast has been extended by a month because a diver missing at Cable Bay has yet to be found.

Rangi Tapu, 25, of Auckland, went missing while diving for kina about 50m offshore last Thursday. As of yesterday he had not been found, despite extensive searches by police, family members, Far North Land Search and Rescue, Coastguard and firefighters. Members of the Police National Dive Squad also conducted a grid search of the sea floor on Friday.

The official search ended on Friday night but the family's beachside vigil is continuing.

A rahui placed on the coast between Mangonui and Taipa by Ngati Kahu kaumatua on Friday has now been extended a month.

Anahera Herbert-Graves, chief executive of Te Runanga-a-Iwi o Ngati Kahu, asked the public to abide by tikanga by not catching fish or taking seafood from the area.

Ngati Kahu tikanga called for a two-week rahui if a body was found in the first week after a drowning; if the body had not been found after a week, a month-long rahui was imposed.

Mrs Herbert-Graves said most people had treated the rahui with respect and understanding, but not all. When told about the rahui, one man replied, "It's a free world, people die", and went fishing.

"If that same man could exercise his grey matter a little, his total lack of respect for the tikanga of Ngati Kahu and for the tapu of the drowned man might have been overcome by the realisation that many fish are carrion eaters and make no differentiation between a dead fish and a drowned man," she said.

"Our tikanga is rooted in spirituality and practicality. We ask that all efforts be made to help people to know and understand why there is a rahui from Mangonui to Taipa."

She said the rahui covered diving and fishing for kaimoana, but not swimming or boating.