Laloo

Hi All

I'm not sure if anyone has been in this situation, but I hope that someone can help.

According to section 6 of the South African Citizenship Act, 1995, A South African citizen who by a formal and voluntary act acquires the citizenship of another country, automatically loses his or her South African citizenship.

And according to section A5.5 of the New Zealand Immigration operations Manual:

b. It is a mandatory requirement (see R2.40) for applicants for residence aged 17 and over to obtain a police or similar certificate from:

1. the applicant's country of citizenship, and
2. each country in which the applicant has lived for 12 months or more in the last 10 years

Ok now my problem, I took out Irish citizenship before moving to the UK just over 15 years ago. I never got permisssion from SA Dept. of Home Affairs to hold dual nationality and now according to SA law, I am no longer an SA citizen. NZ clearly states police certificates must be obtained from country of citizenship and each country that I have lived in, in the last 10 years. As I read it, I only have to get certificates for Ireland and the UK. Although I was born in SA, I am no longer an SA citizen.

I no longer have a SA ID book nor do I have a valid SA passport, mine expired years ago. I believe you need at least one of these to get SA police certificate anyway. It seems like even if I wanted to, I would not be able to get a SA certificate as they will pick up that I have dual nationality and will revoke my SA citizenship if they have not already done so.

Has anyone been in the same situation that can please give me some advice.

This whole thing is just too stressfull. All the hoops you have to jump through.

Thanks in advance.

jengrantmorris

I applied for dual citizenship (section 9) when we obtained UK citizenship so unfortunately I do need a police clearance from SA even though we've not been in the country for almost 5 years, and even then it was only 4 weeks. (Got mine and it has since expired so I need to get it again and they want a new set of fingerprints - as if mine will have changed! But that's a whole other thread.)

In your case I would NOT bother with the SA clearance cert as you 1) haven't been in the country for more than 12 months in the last 10 years and 2) aren't a citizen.

Laloo

Hi jengrantmorris

I'm just worried that the CO will look at my SA birth certificate and wonder why there is no police certificate for SA. They do seem to want to do everything by the book.

jengrantmorris

If they're doing everything by the book they'll realise you've only followed their own guidance, so I think you should be fine.

angpaul

Hi
We left SA 1999 to live in the UK and became UK citizens.We then moved to NZ in 2007 and last year we applied for residency and we had to supply clearance certificates from SA.We supplied our ID numbers and fingerprints and received the certicates in 6 weeks.
Paul

newkiwi

technically, you may or may not be able to win the argument about not having an SA police clearance. do you have your birth certificate? if you do, it will have your ID number on it, and hopefully you should be able to get a police clearance with your ID number and birth certificate.

I think it will be a lot less complicated to have your SA police clearance than not

Laloo

Thanks for all the replies.

'll use my id number and Irish passport and see if I can get it. Its just the time they take to issue the certificate thats so annoying.

Kezzar

I agree, the time this PCC takes is insane!! It's the only thing holding up our application now. I'm only able to courier this over to SAP tomorrow and the waiting time is 6-8 weeks now. I'm so stressed as my husband is due to start work in NZ mid DEC. Other countries are so much more organized than South Africa. Nightmare