Court ruling will ‘open floodgates’

Home Affairs and Immigration Minister Pendukeni Iivula-Ithana says a recent Supreme Court judgement in a citizenship case will “open the floodgates for every child born in Namibia to claim citizenship”.
The Supreme Court ruled on 23 June that a child born in Namibia to a Dutch couple who are here on work permits must be granted Namibian citizenship.
In a bid to circumvent the Supreme Court’s order to grant the child a birth certificate within 30 days, the home affairs ministry and the attorney-general’s office sought to amend the law.
According to the proposed amendment, all those granted citizenship by birth when their parents did not have permanent residence in the country would lose that status.
Iivula-Ithana yesterday said that the Namibian Citizenship Amendment Bill was not rushed and that the government had not breached any prescribed timelines in submitting the amendment to Cabinet.
“I fail to understand what is unbecoming in doing something that is provided for by the supreme law of the land,” she said.
Iivula-Ithana said the first option for her ministry and the attorney-general was to amend the constitution. This option was agreed to by the Cabinet Committee on Legislation and eventually by Cabinet.
She said there was, however, a change of mind by the Executive in the matter, which led to the ministry exploring another route that could be employed to achieve the same purpose that a constitutional amendment would have achieved.
“We are the ones sitting with implementation difficulties because of the judgement and the elected leaders of this country have also considered the matter and are agreeable to have these effects dealt with.”
According to Iivula-Ithana the legitimate purpose that the bill wishes to achieve is to operate within the compliance of the constitution and laws that govern citizenship.


She said Article 4 addresses all the categories of who can qualify for citizenship in Namibia. “However, the issue in question here is the citizenship of persons born on a permit such as work permits, study permits and visitor permits.”
She pointed out that temporary permit holders stay in the country for at the most three years unless the permit is renewed.
Iivula-Ithana said according to the Supreme Court judgement ministerial officials will now have to deal with a case-by-case situation when dealing with children born to parents with temporary permits.
“Unnecessary fear is being instilled in the minds of the Namibian people and this should be arrested in its tracks. Government has interests – just like those who are accusing it of unbecoming behaviour also have interests.
“Some of our people will be happy for us to dish out citizenship left, right and centre, because of narrow interests, but we are aware of the problems that will be created,” the minister said.
She added that American actors Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt were “ordinarily resident” in Namibia when their daughter Shiloh was born and therefore her citizenship would not be revoked. Jolie gave birth to Shiloh at the Cottage Hospital in Swakopmund on 27 May 2006.
“Permanent residence is not a concept that the ministry applies in a vacuum, the Immigration Act, Act 7 of 1993 regulates it.”
In 2014, Namibian Sun reported that the Namibian government had offered Shiloh Namibian citizenship.
The then deputy minister of environment and tourism, Leon Jooste, was quoted as saying Shiloh Nouvel Jolie-Pitt would be allowed to obtain Namibian citizenship if her parents chose to do so.
Local lawyer Norman Tjombe however told Namibian Sun that neither Jolie nor her daughter qualified for Namibian citizenship.
“In terms of the Namibian constitution, a person may be granted Namibian citizenship on the basis of marriage to a Namibian after residence of 10 years or more, or birth from Namibian parents or parents who are ordinarily residing in Namibia, by descent, and by naturalisation after residence of 10 years or more. On all of these grounds, she would not qualify,” he said.

ELLANIE SMIT