The Green Party acknowledges the historical importance of MP Teanau Tuiono’s Member’s Bill, Restoring Citizenship Removed By Citizenship (Western Samoa) Act 1982 Bill, passing its second reading in Parliament today.

“Today marks another momentous step on our journey towards justice in Aotearoa,” says the Green Party’s spokesperson for Pacific Peoples, Teanau Tuiono.

Teanau Tuiono’s Restoring Citizenship Removed By Citizenship (Western Samoa) Act 1982 Bill would restore the right to citizenship for people from Western Samoa who were born between 1924 and 1949, fixing a cruel and targeted law from the 80s.

“With each step we are getting closer to righting a deeply unjust and unfair wrong.

“I am heartened by the will of MPs across the political divide to correct the historical injustice by which the New Zealand Government in 1982 stripped citizenship from thousands of Samoans.

“That right to citizenship was taken away from them despite the Privy Council finding earlier that year that under New Zealand law they were entitled to citizenship.

“The progress of this Bill so far couldn’t have been achieved without the inter-generational efforts of the Samoan community who shared their stories with the select committee.

“Among those in the public gallery today were members of the very community whose right to citizenship was removed. I hope the passage of my Bill goes some way to atoning for past wrongs by the state.

“It is well past time to amend this law and put things right,” says Teanau Tuiono.

Additional information:

• New Zealand citizenship wasn’t created until 1948. Before then, New Zealanders were British subjects
• At the time citizenship was created, New Zealand was administering present day Samoa (known until 1997 as Western Samoa)
• In 1982, Falema‘i Lesa, a Samoan citizen living in New Zealand, was prosecuted for overstaying. She argued she wasn’t overstaying, as she said she was a New Zealand citizen
• The Privy Council ruled that, because earlier NZ legislation had treated those born in Western Samoa after 13 May 1924 as “natural-born British subjects” for the purposes of NZ law, that cohort of people received NZ citizenship when NZ established its own citizenship in 1948
• The Muldoon Government acted swiftly and in 1982 passed the Citizenship (Western Samoa) Act 1982
• The 1982 Act removed NZ citizenship from those people who, under the earlier NZ legislation, had NZ citizenship because they were born in Western Samoa between 13 May 1924 and 1 January 1949, and those claiming citizenship through those people by descent or marriage

The Restoring Citizenship Removed By Citizenship (Western Samoa) Act 1982 would mean that a person whose NZ citizenship was removed by the 1982 Act will be eligible for citizenship as of right, instead of having to go through the standard residency and citizenship application processes.

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