Saifuddin denies accusations over citizenship bids

POKOK SENA: Home Minister Datuk Seri Saifuddin Nasution Ismail (pic) has dismissed allegations that his ministry is in the process of granting Malaysian citizenship on a large scale to foreigners, especially from China.

Without elaborating on the allegations, Saifuddin Nasution described them as “terrible accusations” without a sense of responsibility, which has an impact on the ministry’s efforts to resolve current citizenship application issues.

“This is what we are doing and it is not easy, because this issue of citizenship is highly sensitive, but I reject completely the accusation that this is a process of granting citizenship to foreigners, especially from China.

“Give us the space to resolve the issue of the future of children from Malaysian families whose marriage registration process was not done accordingly.

“There are several problems and we want to help,” he told reporters after presenting a donation for the purchase of a hearse to Masjid Ar-Raudhah, Sungai Durian here yesterday.

At the event, he also presented a citizenship application approval letter to Khatanak Sayyan, 19, who had had no identity document since birth.

Commenting further, Saifuddin Nasution said that there were more than 140,000 citizenship applications received by his ministry, of which 9,000 had been processed, including applications that had been approved.

He added that if the data related to the granting of citizenship is twisted and disseminated, it could give a negative perception of his ministry’s efforts to resolve citizenship issues, including many which were caused by delays in marriage registration.

“There were various reasons for this – sometimes parents fail to immediately register a marriage, while in the case of citizenship, the important prerequisite document is the marriage certificate.

“When there is a lack of that, problems arise for the children over time.

“So, when they (parents) try to correct that, they submit the application and it takes a long time (to be processed); in this case, 19 years, but there are 20 years, 15 years is normal, and also 12 years,” he said.

Previously, the National Registration Department had also denied claims that about 54,000 Chinese nationals were in the process of being granted Malaysian citizenship. — BK