Statelessness Urgent Advice

[Qarrar]

Hello,

Mine is a very weird problem. I was born in the UK in 1985 with one of my parents at the time holding a British Overseas Citizenship. I then lived in Tanzania for 17 years before coming to the UK for further education in 2002. My Tanzanian passport recently expired and I applied for a new one at the London High Commission about six months ago. Having chased them like hounds, in late November they tell me I am not eligible for Tanzanian Citizenship as I wasn’t born in Tanzanian and that my Father had acquired his Tanzanian Citizenship by decent. I am not sure whether this renders me as a stateless person? I have written to the Home Office to enquire about this but going through their website I see that if I am a stateless person then I have to apply for registration as a British Citizen before I turn 22 which is in less than two months! Another point of concern is that I have in total only been in the UK for 4 years and 3 months and one of their requirements is that I should have lived in the for at least 5 years. I don’t know how this will affect my application…..thought I haven’t been outside the UK for more than 450 days within this period.

I would appreciate if anyone who is conversant with this niche area of law could offer some advice. It will be much appreciated….

Qarrar

[JAJ]

There could well be options for you, but before going further you should clarify a few things:

- what was the visa status of your parents when you were born in 1985? Did either of them have Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR)?

- was your father married to your mother?

- which of your parents was British Overseas : mother or father?

- you say your father was Tanzanian "by descent". In that case presumably he was born somewhere outside Tanzania - if so, where was he born and are you sure you have no claim to citizenship of that country?

[Qarrar]

In relation to your first question my mother held British Overseas Citizenship in 1985 with no right of abode. She got her British Citizenship last year with the change in law that was brought into effect. So I am presuming she has the right of abode now but lives in Tanzania with my Father. Yes they are both legally married in Tanzania.

In terms of Tanzanian citizenship, in a nutshell it rests on two prerequisites, place of birth and status of your father or mother and how they acquired their citizenship. So my Father was born in Tanzanian but his father was registered as a Citizen as he wasn’t born in Tanzanian. So in effect my father did not have full citizenship rights to pass onto me and as I was born outside Tanzania I do not meet their requirements, at-least that’s what I understand. My Grandfather if you are still interested was born in Kenya. He held a BOC before he renounced it for Tanzanian Citizenship.

I hope I haven’t confused you with all these details.

[JAJ]

Option 1

It's true that British Overseas citizens do not have Right of Abode in the UK. However, prior to 5 March 2002, British Overseas citizens who arrived in the UK with a work permit were given automatic Indefinite Leave to Remain on arrival.

So if your mother held the work permit, then she would have acquired ILR and you would have acquired British citizenship at birth irrespective of Tanzanian status.

Is her old British passport available?

Option 2

If you really did not acquire Tanzanian citizenship when you were born, then a little known clause of the British Nationality Act 1981 (Schedule 2, section 1) operated to give you British Overseas citizenship. This clause only applied to those born in the United Kingdom or a British Overseas Territory in 1983 or later.

If that was the case, then as a British Overseas citizen and still without Tanzanian citizenship, you would be eligible for registration as a British citizen (by descent) under section 4B of the 1981 Act.

Option 3

The registration option you mention is contained in section 3 of Schedule 2 to the British Nationality Act 1981. Ordinarily it would be preferable to section 4B registration as it gives British citizenship "otherwise than by descent". Unfortunately it's unlikely to work for you because there is an unwaivable requirement that you must have been physically in the United Kingdom or a British Overseas Territory exactly 5 years before making the application.


So if your mother did not have ILR when you were born, section 4B registration may be possible for you. Bear in mind this involves verification that you do not have Tanzanian citizenship and have not lost or renounced it after 4 July 2002.

The Home Office will want to be satisfied that this is the case. Normally they would expect someone born in a country to be a citizen by birth, not by descent (ie your father). There was a case in the 1980s concerning someone who claimed to be a BOC through not having citizenship of Mauritius but this was not accepted by the Home Office:
http://www.uniset.ca/nold/1987IAR340.pdf

[ppron747]

This is most interesting, and I can't help but wonder whether the Tanzanian High Commission is right....

I only have the citizenship legislation from around the time of independence, but it seems pretty clear that, having been born in Tanzania without a parent who was born there, Qarrar's father wouldn't automatically have become a citizen of Tanzania on independence.

If he travelled to UK on a Tanzanian passport, and (most importantly) that passport was correctly issued, it must have been because he was registered or naturalised as a citizen of Tanzania. So he would have been a citizen of Tanzania otherwise than by descent. I don't know what changes have been made to Tanzanian citizenship law since independence, but section 4 of the original citizenship Act provides for automatic transmission of citizenship to children born outside the country where the father is a citizen otherwise than by descent.

Without being able to check subsequent amendments to the law, this is only surmise, but my guess is that the Tanzanian authorities got it right the first time around, when they issued Qarrar with his original passport, and they're wrong now to refuse to renew it...

Incidentally JAJ - not sure if it is a typing error, but are the words "on a work permit" missing from the 2nd sentence of your post of 1.19AM?

[JAJ]

I only have the citizenship legislation from around the time of independence, but it seems pretty clear that, having been born in Tanzania without a parent who was born there, Qarrar's father wouldn't automatically have become a citizen of Tanzania on independence.

I'm also wondering did Tanzania have a loss of nationality clause at a particular age (like Kenya at age 23). It seems that Qarrar's father may have been a CUKC by descent and if he was registered as Tanzanian as a child is it possible he might have lost that status by 1985?

It may depend on when Grandfather renounced his CUKC and when the father was born.

Incidentally JAJ - not sure if it is a typing error, but are the words "on a work permit" missing from the 2nd sentence of your post of 1.19AM?

It was a "thinking more quickly than typing" error - now corrected. Thanks.

[ppron747]

I'm also wondering did Tanzania have a loss of nationality clause at a particular age (like Kenya at age 23). It seems that Qarrar's father may have been a CUKC by descent and if he was registered as Tanzanian as a child is it possible he might have lost that status by 1985?

It may depend on when Grandfather renounced his CUKC and when the father was born.

There was a similar loss provision to that imposed by Kenya - if you held another citizenship at age 21 you lost Tanz automatically... Which means that a lot of people would have lost, given that the age of majority in many countries (including UK) would have been 21 at that time. So for many people it would actually have been impossible to meet the requirement to renounce the other nationality, as renunciation by minors isn't generally possible....

BUT, that isn't what Qarrar has been told is his problem; he says the Tanzanian HC have said his father had some curious non-transmitting form of citizenship by descent that is actually by birth - a citizenship that I can't see in the citizenship act....

My own view is that Qarrar's best way forward is to try to get a written explanation from the Tanzanian HC as to precisely why he isn't (and has never been) a Tanzanian citizen. Then try it on the Home Office for size.

Even if the explanation is rubbish, it still begs the question as to what HO can do to return a non-Tanzanian to a country he wasn't born in, and isn't a citizen of, if (heaven forfend) it comes to that...

[Dawie]

Even if the explanation is rubbish, it still begs the question as to what HO can do to return a non-Tanzanian to a country he wasn't born in, and isn't a citizen of, if (heaven forfend) it comes to that...

Absolutely nothing. Except keep you in stateless limbo with no right to work in the UK but also no right to leave it!

[Qarrar]

In response to JAJ….

Option one

I doubt my mother held a work permit in 1985, because from what I remember seeing in her old passports she was subject to immigration control and her passport was stamped for a period of 6 months each time she entered the UK. She however did stay for longer period in the UK and renew I presume was never a problem. A point to note also is that when she took me back to Tanzania in 1985, the passport stated that I was not eligible for BC or BOC.

Option two

I have searched the internet and legal databases for the British Nationality Act 1981 (Full Text) to no avail. If you have access to a soft copy of this can you please email it to me so that I can take a look at the provision.

Option three

You mention verification that I am not a Tanzanian Citizen. Obviously I would personally only be able to verify this via the Tanzanian High Commission but they seem to know little about the provisions governing my situation and frustratingly they do not respond to my letters as-well.

In response to ppron747…

There was a new Citizenship Act in 1995, link provided.

www.parliament.go.tz/Polis/PAMS/Docs/6-1995.pdf

If the parliamentary website does not work try the UNHCR website below.

http://www.unhcr.org/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/ ... =3ae6b5734

In response to my fathers citizenship, we used to get problems with that as-well (in Tanzania) but I think that was resolved on the grounds that my grandmother was born in Tanzania though she lacked a birth certificate but I think an affidavit had to be made to resolve that issue. I am not entirely sure whether I would also be eligible for a Tanzanian passport on the grounds that one of grandparents did not gain citizenship by decent.

About the passport being correctly issued, one thing that is worth bringing to peoples attention is that anything is possible in Tanzania if you willing to pay extra money. Now whether my initial passport was issued within the law or not I don’t know.

On the question of renouncing my other nationality (I hold none other) the High Commission also mentioned I haven’t done so, again another reason for not issuing me with a passport. I do not understand the rational behind this because I cannot declare I renounce my British Nationality when I have never held British Nationality.

A final note on naturalising as a Tanzanian Citizen, if am to go through this again as a fresh application to the High Commission I will not meet one of their requirements of residing in Tanzania for twelve months immediately preceding my application date.

[JAJ]

Option two

I have searched the internet and legal databases for the British Nationality Act 1981 (Full Text) to no avail. If you have access to a soft copy of this can you please email it to me so that I can take a look at the provision.

This is the British Nationality Act 1981 (as originally enacted, in pdf format)

An unofficial consolidation up to 1 June 2003 (incorporating the new section 4B):
http://www.uniset.ca/naty/BNA1981revd.htm

You may also want to look at the relevant chapters of the Home Office Nationality Instructions:
http://www.ind.homeoffice.gov.uk/lawand ... ns/nismenu

and for an overview: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_nationality_law

Assuming your mother did not have ILR, I suggest you start from a fact-based perspective:

1. If you did not acquire Tanzanian citizenship at birth, you are a British Overseas citizen (BOC).
2. If you are a BOC, then unless Tanzania or some other country has given you citizenship in the meantime, you appear to be eligible for British citizenship.
3. If you did acquire Tanzanian citizenship at birth then you cannot be a British Overseas citizen.
4. You may not be Tanzanian if either your father had the "wrong" class of citizenship, or if he held CUKC/BOC and as a result lost Tanzanian citizenship before you were born. This is where it gets murky.

[Qarrar]

Thank you very much for the info. Last big question, do you think if I get a letter from the immigration department in Tanzania (soon enough) outlining my non entitlement to Tanzanian Citizenship its worth applying under Schedule 2 paragraph 3

[ppron747]

I cannot see how you can apply under Schedule 2 para 3, I'm afraid. Neither the "under 22" requirement nor the "five year" requirement can be varied and, from what you said in your first post, you'll be 22 before you reach the magic five years residence...

BUT if you can get confirmation that you are not, and have never been, a citizen of Tanzania, then you will be a BOC under Schedule 2 para 1 - and eligible for registration as a British citizen under section 4B BNA 1981 (explained n Guidance note BOS).

I should say, though, that the Home Office may take some convincing on this score, and the letter will need to explain in some detail precisely why you're not a Tanzanian citizen - not simply that you're not one, without explanation...

[Qarrar]

Yes I understand that they would have to spell out their grounds for refusal. So which form would I ideally use Registration form S2 or S3

[ppron747]

No form is necessary to establish that you are a BOC.

Schedule 2 para 1 is an automatic provision that applies to children born in UK after 1.1.83 to a BOC/BDTC/BS parent, where the child is stateless at birth. The child automatically takes the status of the BOC/BDTC/BS parent.

So what you're arguing is that you've never been a Tanzanian (despite the fact that you had a Tanzanian passport) and that therefore you've always been a BOC. This should be achievable by letter enclosing your UK birth certificate and the Tanzanian explanation.

If you are successeful in convincing IND of this, then the next stage would be to complete Form BOS for registration as a British citizen.

Howzat?