Finally, the new piece of legislation correcting the 2013 law on Czech Citizenship (Act No. 186/2013 Coll.) has been approved, signed by the Czech President on August 12, 2019, and published as Act No. 207/2019 Coll. on August 22, 2019. It comes into effect on September 6, 2019.
SVU NEWS No.1/2019 reported about this draft on page 16. The credit for this legislative initiative goes to the Czech Senate’s Commission on Compatriots Living Abroad, then under chairmanship of Tomáš Grulich. Co-incidentally, the Commission officialised this proposal on July 11, 2018, on the same day the Senate hosted SVU’s concert in Wallenstein Garden (see also SVU NEWS No. 3/2018).
Observers remember well the famous legislative change of 2013. While the concerned public celebrated introduction of dual citizenship right, many people regretted that the original government draft was deformed by the deputies in February 2013, crossing out the children and grandchildren from the provision for citizenship by declaration. This deformation of law caused problems in families, where children born before the decisive date for dual citizenship right had legally unequal status with their luckier siblings. The children of our people who escaped from Sovietized Czechoslovakia after February 1948 were discriminated by this law, too.
The amendment brings a simple correction by introducing a new paragraph 3 into Article 31, which reads as follows:
“(3) A person whose at least one parent or grandparent is or was former citizen pursuant to Article 31(1), may acquire citizenship of the Czech Republic by means of declaration, if he/she is not citizen of the Slovak Republic on the date of such declaration.“.
The official document from the Collection of Laws (Sbírka zákonů) can be downloaded (PDF) here.
A link to the consolidated Act No. 186/2013 Coll. reflecting this Amendment No. 207/2019 Coll. is here.
