Two stateless children granted citizenship

PUTRAJAYA: Two out of five stateless children cases in the Federal Court have been resolved after the Home Ministry approved registering them as Malaysians.

The citizenship applications of an 18-yearold boy and a 13-year-old-girl were approved under Article 15A of the Federal Constitution.

Meanwhile, the ministry and the National Registration Department (NRD) would consider applications for the remaining three cases after one of them submitted further particulars as requested and the other two filed applications for citizenship under Article 15A of the Federal Constitution.

Article 15A provides special powers to the federal administration to register anyone under 21 years of age as a citizen.

Chief Justice Tan Sri Richard Malanjum, chairing a nine-man Bench, then set Nov 26 for hearing of the appeals in respect of the three cases in the event their applications for citizenship were unsuccessful.

Lawyer Latheefa Koya, representing the family of the 18-year-old boy, informed the Bench that she received a letter granting approval of citizenship for the boy yesterday morning and as such she was withdrawing the appeal.

As for the 13-year-old girl who won her case in the Court of Appeal, Senior Federal Counsel Suzana Atan, representing the ministry, the director-general of the NRD and the government, told the court that she was withdrawing the appeal as the matter had been settled.

Justice Malanjum then struck out the two appeals.

Latheefa who is also representing the family of an eight-year-old boy, said she was informed that the ministry might consider citizenship application for the boy but they were required to submit additional information.

Lawyer Datuk Dr Cyrus Das, appearing for the families of two teenage boys in the remaining two cases, informed the court that they would be filing application for citizenship under Article 15A of the Constitution by Monday.

“We are also retaining Nov 26 for hearing proceedings of the appeal in the event there was no favourable answer to our applications. The application for citizenship under Article 15A is made without prejudice to the pending appeals,” he said.

On Sept 11 last year, the Federal Court granted leave to appeal on several legal questions, including whether the reference to blood or lineage was required under the Constitution in determining the citizenship of the child.

The first two cases involved the 18-year-old whose birth parents were unknown and was adopted by Malaysian parents, and the eightyear-old boy who was born to a Malaysian father and Thai mother who were not legally married when he was born.

Two other cases involved two boys aged 18 and 17 with unknown birth parents and who were separately adopted by two Malaysian couples.

As for the fifth case, the Court of Appeal Bench ordered the government to issue citizenship to the child born to a Malaysian father and a mother from Papua New Guinea. — Bernama