Papua New Guinea (PNG) Minister for Foreign Affairs and Immigration, Rimbink Pato announced that administrative arrangements are being finalised for Dual Citizenship to become a reality in March 2017.
This is an opportunity for Papua New Guineans to be able to take up a new citizenship without automatically losing their PNG citizenship and people who hold citizenship of a prescribed country and wish to gain dual citizenship with PNG.
According to the Minister, the delay in the legislative amendments being certified at the end of 2016 had been completed and this would now enable administrative steps to press ahead.
However, Pato also stressed that a number of considerations were taken into account when processing applications for dual citizenship.
“It has to be stressed that dual citizenship is not an automatic process, but one that needs an applicant to demonstrate that he or she is eligible to be considered for the grant of dual citizenship under the relevant laws,” says Pato.
Whilst highlighting two categories of people who can seek PNG dual citizenship, the Minister affirms that one category is that of PNG citizens who want to hold citizenship of a prescribed country and to turn in their PNG citizenship.
“The other category is that of people who hold citizenship of a prescribed country and wish to gain dual citizenship with PNG,” he says.
The prescribed countries under this arrangement are Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, Vanuatu, Samoa, United Kingdom and United States of America.
The Minister also said that Dual Citizenship is distinguishable from the single citizenship by naturalisation which is still available should one wish to renounce their foreign citizenship and retain only PNG citizenship.
New application fees for those who are applying for dual citizenship as approved by PNG government are as follows;
- Current PNG citizen or former citizen seeking dual citizenship with a prescribed country the fee is K5,000.
- Children of mix parentage turning 18 years old and intend to retain their PNG citizenship the fee is K2,000.
- Citizen of a prescribed country seeking dual citizenship the fee is K15,000.
In November 2013, the proposed amendments to the constitution to allow for dual citizenship received an overwhelming 84-0 votes in its favour at its first reading in Parliament.
