Billionaire’s citizenship a one-off
In 76 cases since 2012 only two others approved, for babies, files show
The circumstances of billionaire Peter Thiel’s New Zealand citizenship were so exceptional they have not been repeated, Internal Affairs figures show. Thiel was made a Kiwi by the Internal Affairs Minister of the day, Nathan Guy, in June 2011 under a rarely used “exceptional circumstances” clause of the Citizenship Act, allowing the technology investor and libertarian to sidestep requirements to have lived — and intend to live — in New Zealand. News of his surprise citizenship broke in the
Herald in January. Given the PayPal founder’s contrarian high-profile backing of the ultimately successful candidacy of Donald Trump for President, the news set off a wave of international publicity about New Zealand as a preferred bolthole for the world’s rich.
Internal Affairs, following requests under the Official Information Act, provided figures to the
Herald of the number of cases where a minister had granted citizenship under the exceptional circumstances clause where prior and future residence requirements were not met.
The results appear to show Citizen Thiel is unique.
Since 2012, the period for which electronic records are available, Internal Affairs said 76 such applications had been filed, but in all but one year every application was rejected by the minister.
For the one year — 2014 — where any such cases were approved, Internal Affairs said the only two such approvals were both granted to newborn babies.
Immigration lawyer Simon Laurent said he had never heard of another case similar to Thiel’s being signed off by a minister and the response from Internal Affairs was not surprising.
“I’ve never assumed that this was a wholesale thing, and it doesn’t surprise me you’ve unearthed the one case so far,” he said.
Labour MP and immigration spokesman Iain Lees-Galloway said the figures cast Guy’s claim he couldn’t remember the application when first asked about the issue in a new light.
Guy, asked again about the Thiel issue, again declined to be interviewed by the Herald.
Through a spokesperson Guy repeated earlier comments that “given the enormous volume of paperwork every minister deals with” he did not recall the case.
The spokesman said Guy had since reread the case file to refresh his memory and was satisfied with his decision.
“The decision to grant Mr Thiel citizenship was backed by officials and in my view was the right one . . . I felt with his good character [and] the contribution he was going to make to New Zealand — and had made — that he was suitable and worthy of being a New Zealand citizen,” Guy said.
Lees-Galloway said the lack of clarity — with confirmation that there were no other surprise Kiwi billionaires lurking on the world stage taking more than a month to arrive — did the Government and New Zealand’s reputation no favours. “The last thing we want to do is give people the impression that our citizenship is up for sale and this affair has certainly created that,” he said.
Questions and a request for interview sent by the
Herald to Thiel’s representatives in the United States again went unanswered.
Government agencies and ministers have strongly rejected any suggestion commercial ties between New Zealand’s spy agencies and Thiel’s Palantir Technologies played any role in granting the billionaire citizenship.
But the extent and length of the relationship between the big data company partfunded by the CIA and New Zealand’s Security Intelligence Service, Government Communications Security Bureau and the Defence Force remain unclear.
The NZDF confirmed, following Official Information Act requests, it had contracted from Palantir since 2012. The GCSB and SIS said they couldn’t confirm or deny a relationship, let alone when it began. All three declined to reveal how much they spent with Palantir.