Seeking to attract foreign workers given the shortage of labor in the country, the German Government yesterday adopted a bill to facilitate the process of obtaining German nationality, which also expands the possibility of maintaining the passport of origin.
The text, pending debate and approval in the Bundestag (lower house of Parliament), could enter into force at the beginning of next year, as announced by the Minister of the Interior, the Social Democrat Nancy Faeser. “We are in the middle of a global competition for the best,” she said, and Germany will only be able to attract them “if they can fully become part of our society in the foreseeable future, with full democratic rights.”
The bill drafted by Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s ruling coalition of Social Democrats, Greens and Liberals provides for German citizenship to be applied for after five years of legal residence, instead of the eight now required. Particularly well-integrated foreigners, who speak the language very well or are distinguished by volunteering, may start the process after three years. With some exceptions, all candidates must demonstrate that they are not economically dependent on public assistance.
The text also raises the possibility that more people have dual nationality, something currently only available to citizens of the European Union and Switzerland. This aspect is relevant for the Turkish community in Germany, some 1.5 million people, workers who arrived from the sixties to work in the factories of the FRG (Gastarbeiter, guest workers) and their descendants, who had to opt for a nationality or the other.
According to figures from the Ministry of the Interior, around 14% of the country’s population, more than 12 million of the 84.4 million inhabitants, do not hold German citizenship, and of these, 5.3 million have lived in Germany for at least ten years.
Naturalization in Germany is below the EU average, with a rate of 1.1% compared to 2% for the community club, partly due to the requirement to renounce one’s nationality of origin to obtain a German passport. In 2022, German citizenship was granted to around 168,500 people.
The conservative opposition, made up of the Christian Democrat CDU and the Bavarian Social Christian CSU, rejected the text. The Christian Social deputy Andrea Lindholz argued that “integration takes time and is more than work and language”, and said that the Government “sends completely wrong signals” at a time when municipalities are facing difficulties in managing immigration, and that the priority should be to reduce “irregular immigration”. The far-right AfD also attacked the bill.
“We want people who have been part of our society for a long time to be able to participate in the democratic organization of our country,” insisted Minister Faeser. The future law specifies that those who have committed anti-Semitic, racist and discriminatory acts will be excluded from the possibility of nationalization.
