Botswana July 2006 |
|
| No plans to relax citizenship acquisition, (Mmegi, 2006-07-28):-The Ministry of Labour and Home Affairs has no plans to relax the language requirement system for foreigners to acquire Botswana citizenship, Assistant Minister Olifant Mfa told parliament last week. He said in the system, which has some similarities with the Australian one and still on its second year, a candidate should meet the score of 70% or above, subject to an annual quota of 200. Mfa said instead of relaxing the system his ministry will be monitoring its impact and only in special circumstances will he award citizenship to an applicant who fails to satisfy the language requirement. Mfa was responding to a question by MP for Bobirwa Shaw Kgathi who wanted to know the requirements needed for someone to qualify for citizenship through naturalisation or otherwise and whether the eligibility criteria, which are currently in force are similar to those of any other country. The MP further wanted to know if there are any plans to relax some of the requirements in order to facilitate the recruitment of people with scarce skills or those that contribute to the development of the country through investment. The minister explained that citizenship may be obtained by settlement, adoption and registration, by presidential powers and by naturalisation. He said that by naturalisation the law requires that an applicant should have resided in Botswana for a continuous period of 10 years in aggregate during the period of 12 years immediately preceding the application and must be of good character. The applicant must also have sufficient knowledge of Setswana or any other language spoken by any tribal community in the country. Mfa said since 2004 the point system is applied to occupation/skills, (40%) level of investment (40%), spouse skills 10%) and other relevant qualifications (10%). | |
South African Migration Project (SAMP) - Queen's University - http://www.queensu.ca/samp |