80 Years On: Filipino-Japanese Descendant Eager for Japanese Citizenship

   Tokyo, Aug. 13 (Jiji Press)--Jose Takei, an 82-year-old man of Japanese descent in the Philippines, who became stateless after being left in the Southeast Asian nation following the end of World War II, is keen to get Japanese citizenship while he is in good health.
   Earlier this month, almost 80 years after the end of the war, Takei came to Japan for the first time, with the support of Japan's Foreign Ministry. He met with his relatives in the city of Kawachinagano in Osaka Prefecture, western Japan, last Wednesday. During the visit, he also filed for Japanese nationality with Tokyo Family Court.
   Takei was born in May 1943 to a Japanese man who was an employee of the Philippines' national railway company and an unmarried Filipino woman.
   Takei's father left the family just before his son was born to join the then Japanese military. A reference check with Japan's welfare ministry in 2009 found that the father returned to Japan at the end of the war.
   Before the war, many Japanese nationals moved overseas at the request of the government, including about 30,000 to the Philippines. Some of them married local women.

(2025/08/13-09:00)