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An expat family in Doha, Qatar says they’re facing daily fines because their new-born baby has not been able to secure an unabridged birth certificate or the necessary travel documents.
Cape Town - Zaahir Hallow and his family are South African citizens living and working abroad in Qatar.
He says he has been out of South Africa for almost seven and a half years, trying to earn a living and make a better life for himself and his family.
But for Hallow, the move was never about relinquishing SA citizenship.
Far from it, he says.
Although his family has been out of South Africa and living abroad, says Hallow, they remain Proudly South African.
“SA is our home and we are making the sacrifice to be away from it, so that we can earn a better living and provide a better life for our children.”
And it is the identity of Hallow’s youngest child that has him quite distressed.
The right to Nationality or Qatari Citizenship is reserved for Qatari citizens only, so any expat child born in the country does not qualify for citizenship. However questionable Qatar’s guest worker rules and regulations may seem it is designed in order to protect one of the richest countries per capita in the world. The same rules apply for all Gulf Co-operative Countries, including the UAE and Bahrain.
“Since leaving South Africa, I have had two more children in Qatar and my family has grown to six; my wife, my three beautiful daughters Aaliyah (8), Misha (7), Ameena (3-months-old) and my son and Abdurahman (3).
Hallow says both Ameena and Abdurahman were born in a state hospital in Doha.
As an expat birth, Hallow had to register his children with the local ministry of interior in Doha, as well as with the Department of Home Affairs in order to obtain their birth certificates and the necessary travel documents for his children to legally remain in Qatar.
And it is here that Hallow believes the plight of Expats needs to be highlighted.
Hallow told Traveller24 Ameena was born on the 27th October 2014 and despite the initial application having been submitted to the SA Embassy on the 29th October and the documents having been sent via the Diplomatic Postal Bag at beginning of November - to date nothing has arrived.
“We went through this process with our son, and even though it took a few months for the original official documents to arrive via the Diplomatic Mission, we were still able to obtain a temporary South African passport for him, that allowed us to travel as a family.”
South Africa stopped issuing temporary passports as of 1 September 2014. Every expat living or born in Qatar has to have a residency visa issued and inserted into their passports.
While the older children have already had the opportunity to travel to South Africa, Hallow says it is the new born who is not recognized as a citizen of anywhere, as she does not possess a South African birth certificate or passport.
“This has been quite distressing for our entire family as we are not able to leave Qatar or return home to SA as she does not possess the necessary travel documents.”
“All we have been told by SA Embassy staff is that ‘her application is in process’ and there is nothing that they can do.
Hallow says he cannot understand the lengthy delay in issuing a passport to SA Nationals who are out of the country, since it usually takes less than three weeks to renew a passport from inside South Africa.
“We have been told that it will take up to 6 months for her documents to be processed, but what the SA home affairs department doesn't realize is that we are fined huge amounts for every day that our daughter stays in Qatar without a passport or visa.
“And there is nothing that we can do about it,” says Hallow
The Qatari ministry of interior issues a grace period of two months to allow for the registration and issuing of passports to new-borns. But this period has long since ended and the Hallows have been fined QR10 (about ZAR33) per day for late Residency Visa registration.
That works out to roughly R1 000 per month for each of the two months overdue or an expected R6 000 if they do have to wait the maximum six-month period as stated.
“Some families have waited for more than six months to get a passport, and in one case that I know of the family waited up to 18 months to get the child's birth certificate.
“However, the family was able to get a temporary passport from the Embassy, which at that stage was still authorized to issue temporary passports back then.
Traveller24 contacted the department of home affairs, highlighting the plight of the Hallows family.
The Department of Home Affairs spokesperson Mayihlome Tshwete said he would look into the matter and get back to Traveller24 to confirm what the issue was.
Tshwete said the department was trying its best to provide services as effectively and efficiently as possible but admitted that turn-around times were a big issue.
He attributed it to the fact the department’s systems are not modernised.
“In some instances you literally have somebody who has to go through a warehouse of files in order to produce the required document. This unfortunately is very time consuming, but the department is looking at a complete system overhaul. It is quite a process and could take up to a year to complete.
“You’ll note the turnaround with smartcard IDs has improved. Previously it would take three months to issue but this has been reduced to two weeks. So there is definitely an improvement in turnaround,” Tshwete said.
According to Hallow this is not an isolated incident, describing his experiences with other South African families living abroad in Qatar saying documents have been “lost, or delayed for more than a year”.
“The frustration we feel is felt by many expats living abroad and this is not only related to Birth Certificates and Passports, as getting documents certified and attested is an administrative nightmare.
“The Government is very quick to accept the funds we pump back into the country, and they are even quicker to gather votes from all of us abroad, but when it comes to providing a decent Constitutional right to Identity, then innocent children and families are being punished.”
