The Democratic Alliance (DA) says it is confident that thousands of South Africans who lost their citizenship without their knowledge ‘will soon receive justice’.
This follows the high court’s reserving judgment this week in the case brought by the DA against the Department of Home Affairs, in which the party argued that Section 6(1)(a) of the South African Citizenship Act 88 of 1995 is unconstitutional.
According to a DA statement, the application of this section ‘sees South Africans who apply for a second nationality automatically lose their South African citizenship unless they actively retain their citizenship through successfully applying to the Minister of Home Affairs for a “retention of citizenship”.
‘Home Affairs claims this loss of citizenship is being done by personal choice whereas many South Africans lose their citizenship without even knowing it. Almost 2 million South Africans currently live abroad, with thousands potentially affected by this arcane law.’
The party argues that Section 6(1)(a) of the Act ‘is inconsistent with the Constitution, and with section 20 of the Constitution in particular, which states that “No citizen may be deprived of citizenship”. Not only does Section 6(1)(a) unreasonably violate this right by depriving citizens of citizenship, but it does so without even affording them any notice.’
In its heads of argument submitted to the court in late 2020, the DA argued: ‘All persons who had lost their South African citizenship in terms of Section 6(1)(a) of the Act on or after 6 October 1995 are South African citizens; and that all persons referred to above may apply to the Minister in terms of Section 15 of the Act for the appropriate certificate of citizenship.’
The statement added: ‘The “retention of citizenship” service remains closed even under lockdown level 1 despite the DA informing the Minister that citizens will be denied their constitutional right to citizenship and requesting that the service be urgently reopened.’
The party said after the court reserved judgment on the matter that it was ‘confident that these citizens who have been unfairly deprived of their citizenship will soon receive justice’.