Latest news with #renunciation
Independent Singapore
7 days ago
- Business
- Independent Singapore
Over 97,000 Malaysians have become Singapore citizens since 2015
Despositphotos/Bennian SINGAPORE: According to Malaysia's Home Ministry, nearly 100,000 Malaysians have reportedly become citizens of Singapore in the past decade. The ministry told Malaysia's Parliament on Monday (Aug 11) that between 2015 and June 2025, there have been a total of 97,318 such individuals. The Star said that the Home Ministry provided a breakdown of the number of Malaysians who renounced their citizenship by year in a written reply to Datuk Seri Takiyuddin Hassan. There were 7,394 renunciations in 2015, 8,654 in 2016, 7,583 in 2017, and 7,665 in 2018, before rising substantially in 2019 to 13,362. In 2020, the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of renunciations dropped to 5,591, but rose in 2021 to 7,956, before falling again to 5,623 in 2022. The numbers have been increasing in the past three years: in 2023, there were 11,500 renunciations, and they reached an all-time high last year of 16,930. Last week, the New Straits Times reported that between January and June of this year, more than 6,000 Malaysians have given up their blue passports for Singapore's red one . Malay Mail also noted that over the past 50 years, around 1.86 million Malaysians have decided to relocate overseas, leading to the establishment of TalentCorp in 2011 to encourage skilled workers to return to the country. The aim of TalentCorp, which falls under the purview of the country's Prime Minister, is to create strategies that will attract Malaysians to return to its shores. Around 5.6% of the country's population has decided to move to another country over the past five decades, a figure that is considerably higher than the global average of about 3.6%. TalentCorp said that the top five countries preferred by Malaysians to relocate to are: Singapore, Australia, the United States of America, the United Kingdom, and Canada. 'Notably, 3.3% of the total Malaysian population has migrated to Singapore, amounting to 1.13 million individuals, which constitutes 60% of the Malaysian diaspora,' Malay Mail quoted TalentCorp group chief executive officer Thomas Mathew as saying last month. Many consider this 'brain drain' to be a significant problem. In July, Dr Zaliha Mustafa, Minister in the Prime Minister's Department (Federal Territories) Dr Zaliha Mustafa, proposed the setting up of a registry that would measure how severe the issue is. /TISG Read also: '6,060 Malaysians have given up their citizenship for Singapore so far in 2025' — Home Minister says, and that could be just the beginning… () => { const trigger = if ('IntersectionObserver' in window && trigger) { const observer = new IntersectionObserver((entries, observer) => { => { if ( { lazyLoader(); // You should define lazyLoader() elsewhere or inline here // Run once } }); }, { rootMargin: '800px', threshold: 0.1 }); } else { // Fallback setTimeout(lazyLoader, 3000); } });
Malay Mail
11-08-2025
- Politics
- Malay Mail
Nearly 100,000 Malaysians became Singaporeans over past decade, Parliament told
KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 11 — A total of 97,318 Malaysians have reportedly renounced their citizenship to become citizens of Singapore between 2015 and June 2025, the Home Ministry told Parliament today. According to The Star, the ministry said in a written reply to Datuk Seri Takiyuddin Hassan (PN–Kota Bharu) that there were 7,394 renunciations in 2015, 8,654 in 2016, and 7,583 in 2017. The number rose to 7,665 in 2018 before jumping to 13,362 in 2019. It dropped to 5,591 in 2020, but climbed to 7,956 in 2021 and 5,623 in 2022. The figure surged again to 11,500 in 2023 and reached its highest level in 2024 with 16,930. This year, as of June 30, 6,060 Malaysians have made the change. Malaysia has long battled a significant brain drain, with an estimated 1.86 million Malaysians relocating abroad over the past five decades prompting the establishment of TalentCorp to encourage skilled returnees.
Malay Mail
09-08-2025
- Politics
- Malay Mail
Over 6,000 Malaysians switched citizenship to Singapore in just six months, Home Ministry records show
KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 9 — The number of Malaysians giving up their citizenship for Singapore has surged sharply in recent years, with over 6,000 doing so in the first half of 2025 alone. Home Minister Datuk Seri Saifuddin Nasution Ismail said 6,060 Malaysians had renounced their citizenship as of June 30 this year. 'The preceding years saw 7,394 cases in 2015 followed by 8,654 (2016), 7,583 (2017) and 7,665 (2018),' he said in a written parliamentary reply to Kota Bharu MP Datuk Seri Takiyuddin Hassan who asked for the number of Malaysians who applied for Singaporean citizenship from 2015 to 2025. Last year saw 16,930 citizenship renunciations, up from 11,500 in 2023. The figure in 2022 was 5,623, lower than the 7,956 recorded in 2021. The highest annual total before last year was 13,362 cases in 2019, before falling to 5,591 in 2020 during the Covid-19 pandemic.
National Post
25-05-2025
- Politics
- National Post
The pontiff's passport: Can the U.S. strip Pope Leo XIV of his citizenship?
Article content 'The State Department never assumes that you intend to lose your citizenship unless you specifically say so through the renunciation process,' Spiro said. Article content He said it would be hard to argue that Leo, by becoming pope, demonstrated an intent to give up being a U.S. citizen. Article content 'I think it's highly unlikely that the U.S. moves to terminate the pope's citizenship,' Spiro said. Article content Peruvian law has no conflict with Pope Leo remaining a citizen, said Jorge Puch, deputy director of registry archives at Peru's National Registry of Identification and Civil Status. Article content Leo was granted Peruvian citizenship in August 2015, the month before Pope Francis appointed him bishop of Chiclayo in the South American country's northern region. To qualify, he had to live in Peru for at least two years and pass a civics test. Article content Article content 'It is the most praiseworthy thing our beloved supreme pontiff could have done: Wanting to have Peruvian nationality without having been Peruvian by birth,' Puch said. Article content Article content All adult Peruvians, including naturalized citizens, are required to vote in elections through age 69. Voting in Peru's presidential election next April won't be mandatory for Leo. He turns 70 in September. Article content It's not clear what happened to the citizenship status of Leo's predecessors once they became pope. That's not information the Vatican discloses. Article content Pope Francis renewed his passport in his home country of Argentina in 2014, the year after he became pope. German-born Pope Benedict XVI and Pope John Paul II, a native of Poland, never publicly relinquished citizenship in their home countries. Article content Article content Margaret Susan Thompson, a Syracuse University history professor and expert on American Catholicism, said she doubts Leo would renounce his U.S. citizenship. But she believes the new pope was sending a message when he delivered his first speech in Italian and Spanish without using English. Article content 'I think he wants to stress that he is the pope of the universal Catholic Church,' Thompson said, 'and not an American holding that position.' Article content Yes. Here are a few notable examples. Article content Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was born in New York to British parents in 1964. He left the U.S. as a young boy and renounced his American citizenship in 2016 while serving as the U.K.'s foreign secretary. Johnson became prime minister three years later. Article content Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed was an American citizen when he was elected president of Somalia in 2017. Born in Somalia, he moved to the U.S. in 1985 and became a citizen in the 1990s. Mohamed gave up his U.S. citizenship two years into his presidency. Article content Valdas Adamkus became a U.S. citizen after his family fled Lithuania to escape Soviet occupation. He returned to win Lithuania's presidency in 1998, years after the Soviet Union collapsed. He relinquished his American citizenship after being elected. Article content
Free Malaysia Today
16-05-2025
- Politics
- Free Malaysia Today
Muslim convert fails in bid to return to Christianity
The Court of Appeal today reaffirmed that shariah courts have exclusive jurisdiction in cases involving the renunciation of Islam, and the civil courts cannot interfere. PUTRAJAYA : The Court of Appeal here has dismissed a Muslim convert's attempt to renounce Islam and revert to his original faith of Christianity. Justice M Nantha Balan, who chaired a three-judge panel, held that the man's appeal had no merit. Sitting with him were Justices Nazlan Ghazali and Azmi Ariffin. The 47-year-old man married a Muslim woman in 2010. However, they divorced five years later. In 2016, he filed an application in the shariah court to renounce Islam, but was ordered to attend 'counselling sessions' instead. The shariah court subsequently dismissed his renunciation application and ordered that he undergo further counselling sessions. The man's appeal to the shariah appeals court was also rejected. He then turned to the civil courts seeking to nullify the shariah court's decision, and sought a declaration that he is entitled to profess his original faith. His legal challenge was dismissed by the High Court in 2023. Nazlan, who read out the judgment today, said the civil court had no jurisdiction to hear cases from the shariah courts. 'This is not a case of him never being a Muslim but a renunciation (of Islam). 'We affirm that shariah courts have the exclusive jurisdiction to hear these cases and civil courts cannot interfere,' he added. The court also noted that the shariah court had dismissed the man's application to renounce Islam on grounds that the evidence presented was 'insufficient'. 'He can apply again before the shariah court,' Nazlan said, noting that there had been cases of successful renunciations. The court made no order as to costs. The man was represented by lawyers Iqbal Harith Liang and Firdaus Danial Tan, while senior federal counsel Idayu Amir appeared for the federal government.
