The DA notes the judgment handed down by the North Gauteng High Court today which is a blow to thousands of South Africans who have lost their citizenship without their knowledge.
The DA believes that section 6(1)(a) of the South African Citizenship Act (88 of 1995) 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 who take on a second nationality of citizenship without a ‘retention of citizenship’, but it does so without even affording them any notice.
For these reasons, the DA launched the necessary legal action to strike down section 6(1)(a) but also establish a means for former citizens to reclaim their South African citizenship.
The Department of Home Affairs claimed this loss of citizenship is being done by personal choice when this is clearly not the case. The DA has been approached by requests from thousands of affected South Africans who had no intention to renounce citizenship and only found out they had lost their citizenship when travelling back to South Africa.
The DA will study the judgment before deciding on a further course of action.
The DA will continue to fight irrational limitations to the constitutional rights of South Africans.