1. Discriminatory Nationality Laws
A constitutional provision stipulates that a child born in Singapore to a citizen mother and a father who is a foreign diplomat will not be a citizen. This is despite the fact the child should be eligible for citizenship by descent through their citizen mother. The limitation on the ability of married women to confer nationality to their foreign spouse on the same basis as men also constitutes gender discrimination.
Finally, Singapore law’s retention of the concept of illegitimacy, as applied to children born out of wedlock, creates a discriminatory imbalance and an increased risk of statelessness for these “illegitimate” children. References in the citizenship constitutional law to children’s fathers or parents are to be construed as references to their mothers only. This means that for children whose father is a Singaporean citizen yet their mother is not, they may not acquire Singapore citizenship by birth or descent.
2. Lack of Legal Safeguards Against Childhood Statelessness
Citizenship laws of Singapore provide explicit protection to foundling children, deeming them citizens at birth. However, there is no explicit protection provided to stateless children, leaving the children of stateless people in Singapore at a greater risk of becoming/remaining stateless themselves, and potentially perpetuating the stateless status through several generations. This risk can, in theory, be tempered by the Government’s exercise of its discretionary power to grant citizenship by birth or registration to any child in Singapore. Children of migrant workers and foreigners within Singapore are at risk of statelessness due to this lack of protection.
3. Citizenship Stripping
The government may deprive citizens by registration or naturalization (or those enrolled as citizens prior to Singapore’s 1965 independence) of their citizenships under a series of circumstances, most notably if they resided outside of Singapore for five continuous years without registering annually at the Singaporean consulate. When a citizen renounces their citizenship or is deprived thereof, their citizen children of under 21 years may also be deprived of their citizenship. According to Article 140(2) of the Constitution, decisions made by the government regarding citizenship “shall not be subject to appeal or review in any court”.
4. Administrative Barriers
While there are many varied experiences and causes of statelessness in Singapore, administrative barriers due to a lack of documentation (which was either lost, destroyed or never possessed) are a major cause of statelessness, specifically among older populations who were born in pre- Independence Singapore. In 2016, it was reported by a member of Parliament that 74% of the stateless population in Singapore were over 50 years of age.
Additionally, the criteria considered by the Immigration & Checkpoints Authority when evaluating applications for citizenship are intentionally opaque. The Minister for Home Affairs & Minister for Law, K. Shanmugam, commented in October 2016 that “we do not reveal the detailed criteria for granting PR and SC as it is not in our interest to do so”. However, it is clear that “family profile” will be considered a factor, and it is therefore likely that a birth registration will be a piece of supporting evidence for acquiring citizenship. Media reports over the recent years raising the profile of stateless persons have highlighted a considerable number of profiles of people whose applications have failed due to lack of documentation, for instance, because of an inability to provide parents’ identity documents due to no longer being in contact with them, or because of an inability to provide a birth certificate, either as a result of not being registered at birth because parents did not provide their marriage certificate, or simply because it was lost. These examples, of which there are many, highlight that a lack of administrative documentation remains an important barrier for stateless persons seeking to obtain citizenship.
With regard to birth registration, failure to register a child’s birth within 42 days of the date of birth can result in a fine and/or imprisonment. These late penalties present a major barrier to ensuring universal birth registration. Further, Singapore does not register births that occurred overseas. If a child is born overseas, the parents must register the child’s birth and obtain a birth certificate from the foreign authorities in the country where the child is born. Despite these barriers, Singapore reported a 100% birth registration rate in 2021.
Despite these barriers, Singapore reported a 100% birth registration rate in 2021.
