Manama: A committee in the lower chamber of Bahrain’s bicameral parliament has rejected a proposal to allow Bahraini women married with foreigners to pass on their citizenship to their children.
The proposal submitted in mid-April wanted to amend Paragraph “a” of Article Four of the 1963 law which specified the father should be a Bahraini national in order to pass on the citizenship and change the wording from father to ‘either of the child’s parents’.
The Foreign Affairs, Defence and National Security Committee said that the issue of granting citizenship should be strictly controlled.
“Equality is already achieved by giving children born to Bahraini mothers access to the same health, education and housing services provided to citizens,” the committee said.
“Legislation in other Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries — such as Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Saudi Arabia — follows the same legislative approach as Bahrain.”
The Supreme Council for Women, (SCW), a staunch campaigner for women empowerment, and several women’s rights activists have been pushing for elevating the status of women in the country by granting them the right to pass on their citizenship on to their children. Bahraini mothers married to foreigners face a slew of problems related to residency, education and travel. King Hamad Bin Eisa Al Khalifa has granted the Bahraini nationality to hundreds of people born to Bahraini mothers and foreign fathers — once in 2006 and another time in 2011.
In 2009, foreign wives of Bahraini nationals and children born to Bahraini mothers and foreign fathers were given access to the same health and education services as Bahraini citizens. They were also exempted from fees related to residence permits.
