Tottori: 95-Year-Old Japanese Descendent from Philippines Visits Father’s Grave

The Yomiuri Shimbun

15:47 JST, February 21, 2026

HOKI, Tottori — An elderly woman of Japanese descent who was left behind in the Philippines during the turmoil of the Pacific War visited her father’s grave in his hometown of Hoki, Tottori Prefecture, in January.

According to a Tokyo-based Philippine Nikkei-jin Legal Support Center, 95-year-old Rosalina Kamba is a second-generation Japanese immigrant who lives in the southern Philippine city of Davao. Her father was a Japanese native who moved to the Philippines and her mother was a local woman. Her father was deported to Japan and died in 1983.

Kamba never spent time with her father and only remembers meeting him once when she was around 10 years old while he was wearing a military uniform. She now lives with her daughter and grandchildren.

Kamba visited Japan for the first time while accompanied by her two daughters as part of a support project organized by the Japanese Foreign Ministry. On Jan. 30, she visited Hoki and placed her hand on her father’s gravestone.

Kamba’s 63-year-old daughter said, “Thank you to everyone involved, as my mother’s longtime wish has finally come true.”

According to the supporting organization, Kamba filed a petition with the Tokyo Family Court in June 2024 to create a new family register to obtain Japanese citizenship, but the court rejected the application, citing insufficient evidence of her parents’ marriage. She is now preparing to file another petition with the Yonago Branch of the Tottori Family Court.