Rights body seeks royal support to block Malaysia's citizenship Bill

The Human Rights Commission of Malaysia is seeking royal support to block new citizenship laws that it says will render more people in the country stateless.

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The commission, commonly referred to by its Malay-language acronym Suhakam, is planning to submit a memorandum to the Conference of Rulers by July 16, outlining its objections to proposed legal amendments which have been described as “regressive” and “cruel” by critics.

Amendments to the Federal Constitution related to citizenship matters must have the consent of the Conference of Rulers – a council comprising the nine rulers of the Malay states of Negeri Sembilan, Selangor, Perlis, Terengganu, Kedah, Kelantan, Pahang, Johor and Perak, and the governors of the other four states, Penang, Melaka, Sabah and Sarawak.

One of the changes proposed by the Anwar administration is a long-awaited amendment to finally automatically confer citizenship to children born overseas to Malaysian mothers. But the new law will not be applied retrospectively, rendering it ineffective for those already born to Malaysian mothers outside the country.

Currently, only children born to Malaysian fathers abroad are automatically conferred Malaysian citizenship.

“We want it to be retrospective,” Suhakam commissioner Ragunath Kesavan, a former Malaysian Bar president, told The Straits Times.

Other proposed amendments are aimed at making it tougher to obtain citizenship, including lowering the age limit of childhood citizenship applications from 21 to 18, removing automatic citizenship for children of permanent residents born in the country, and stripping foreign wives of citizenship if the marriage is dissolved within two years of them becoming Malaysian.