On 20 August 2021, a reform of the German Nationality Act (amending Sec. 5 and Sec. 15 StAG) came into force. Since then, there exists a limited (ten-year) right of self-declaration (naturalization of old cases) under Sec. 5 StAG, i.e. until 19 August 2031, and a new option under Sec. 15 StAG to acquire citizenship in the context of the redress of historical injustices (reparative naturalization), for an indefinite period.
On 20 August 2021, a reform of the German Nationality Act (amending Sec. 5 and Sec. 15 StAG) came into force. Since then, there exists a limited (ten-year) right of self-declaration (naturalization of old cases) under Sec. 5 StAG, i.e. until 19 August 2031, and a new option under Sec. 15 StAG to acquire citizenship in the context of the redress of historical injustices (reparative naturalization), for an indefinite period (cf. our previous articles on the matter: https://bnt.eu/de/nachrichten-zum-wirtschaftsrecht/liberalisierung-im-deutschen-stag-in-kraft-getreten/). We shall have a closer look at the reform by examining two examples, and present the latest statistics of the Federal Office of Administration (BVA).
One historically interesting case which bnt has successfully brought to a close involved the descendants of Karl-Philipp Rosenberg, a German citizen born in 1909 in Haltern am See in Westphalia, who was “of Jewish religion,” according to his Prussian birth certificate. His father’s 1863 birth certificate, which bnt obtained from the archives, also had this addition. After fleeing to the Netherlands in 1933, returning to the German Reich, being arrested and imprisoned in the Esterwegen concentration camp until the summer of 1936 (when it was dissolved), he and his uncle Adolf Rosenberg finally managed to escape Germany in 1937; his uncle Adolf went to the U.S., he himself to Belgium, then to France, where he joined the French Résistance in 1941 and fought against the German occupiers in France until 1944/1945. His mother did not manage to escape and was murdered in Theresienstadt in 1942. Karl-Philipp’s daughter, who now lives in London, was born in France in 1941; he himself had become a Belgian citizen in 1947 and emigrated to Spain in 1952 where he died in 1985. His material claims were rejected in reparation proceedings in 1962 because he supposedly no longer held German citizenship, having forfeited it in November 1941 under the 11th Decree implementing the Reich Citizenship Law, according to which all Jews of German citizenship residing outside the Greater German Reich were denaturalized, and because he could not produce registration certificates for the years 1941 to 1945 – but he was living in the French underground!!!
bnt coordinated the applications under Article 116 (2) GG for his daughter in London, his grandchildren in France and the USA, and his great-grandchildren in Mexico. Although Karel-Philipp Rosenberg was naturalized in Belgium in 1947, it was not necessary to reinterpret the applications as having been filed pursuant to Article 15(4) GG (note, however, that in other constellations, this may be the preferred solution instead of allowing naturalization under Article 116(2) GG, since Article 15 StAG is intended for precisely such cases).
In three proceedings according to Sec. 5 StAG – right of self-declaration – bnt has been representing two families in Nicaragua: In both cases, the mothers of the applicants, whose fathers had emigrated from Germany in the 1920s and 1930s, had retained German citizenship. They had both gone on to marry a Nicaraguan in the 1950s, and the applicants were born in 1960 and in 1967 (twins). Sec. 5 (1) is supposed to address such cases, because until 1975, children of German mothers who had a foreign father could not acquire German citizenship (only children with a German father could); in the case of illegitimate children of German fathers, this unconstitutional unequal treatment applied until 1993 (only the illegitimate children of German mothers became German citizens); also, the transition periods had ended in 1977 and 1995, respectively, but many of those affected had missed these deadlines. Now they have a right to declare under Section 5 StAG until August 19, 2031. The three pending procedures have not yet been finally resolved.
Unfortunately, proceedings under Sec. 5 and Sec. 15 StAG tend to be very protracted. The case of Mrs. Rosenberg from London was decided swiftly because she was born in 1941, i.e., she hails from the so-called “survivor generation”. The BVA is making great strides in processing, but is facing a huge mountain of applications under Article 116(2) GG. The processing time can be up to two years or even longer. In fact, since Brexit, the number of applications has risen sharply to around 15,000 per year, and between 1 January 2021 and 21 August 2022, the BVA has received 10514 applications pursuant Article 116(2) GG – that is, 30 applications per day – but has during the same time managed to issue 13032 naturalization certificates, i.e. more than 40 per day. Only 12 applications were refused. In addition, as of 20 August 2021, 3620 applications were submitted under Section 15 of the StAG, i.e. about 10 applications per day, of which only 856 applications have been granted so far (and only one application refused). Of the applications pursuant to Sec. 15 StAG which have already been decided, 285 concerned persons and their ancestors who had lived in Germany between 1933 and 1945 but had to leave Germany because of persecution – even if they were, for example, Polish, Czechoslovak or Romanian citizens, because the right to German citizenship may indeed exist even if one’s ancestors were themselves never German citizens (Sec. 15 (4), though it is still unclear what is meant by ‘Germany’, i.e. within which borders: 1937, 1938, 1939 or 1941?), 64 applications concerned applicants or their ancestors who were excluded from naturalization (Sec. 15 (3)), 78 applications concerned applicants or their ancestors who were excluded from collective naturalization (Sec. 15 (2), e.g. those who did not make it on the lists of citizens (so-called Volkslisten) in e.g. Danzig, Memel, the Sudetenland, the Protectorate or Galicia due to their Jewish origin, though the BVA remains silent on the details). Finally, 550 applications concerned applicants or their ancestors who had ‘renounced or lost German citizenship before 26 February 1955’ within the meaning of Section 15 (1).
Since 20 August 2021 the BVA has received 6815 applications pursuant to Section 5 StAG (as of 21 August 2022), i.e., approximately 20 applications per day. The majority of these applications which have already been decided (681) were filed on behalf of applicants who had a German father or mother but could not acquire German citizenship through that parent (Sec. 5 (1)), and there were 25 successful applications under Sec. 5 (2) by children whose mothers had lost their German citizenship before the applicants were born by marriage to a foreigner (under Sec. 17 (6) of the RuStAG in its previous wording in force until 31 March 1953) and two children (Sec. 5 (3)) had lost their German citizenship after birth on the basis of legitimation (under Section 17 (5) of the RuStAG in its previous wording in force until 31 March 1953). In addition, there were 827 successful applications (Sec. 5 (4)) by descendants of the persons listed in paras. (1) through (3).
Overall, more than 10,000 applications were submitted in the first year under the new Sections 5 and 15 of the StAG, plus 10,000 applications under Article 116(2) of the GG as of 1 January 2021. Applications under Section 15 of the StAG and Article 116(2) of the GG, i.e. applications with reference to emigration (approx. 15,000 applications), account for approx. 10-15% of all naturalizations in Germany each year, as there were approx. 110,000 and 13,600 successful naturalizations in 2020 and 2021. In addition, there are 7,000 applications under Section 5 of the StAG, i.e. approximately 5% of all naturalizations per year. In addition to the applications submitted to the BVA pursuant to Article 116(2) GG and Sections 5 and 15 of the StAG (approx. 22,000 applications as of 1 January 2021), applications which are not decided by the BVA but by the German immigration offices and district administrations must be added. (These latter authorities are competent to handle the case if the applicants live in Germany rather than abroad.) However, there will be no more than a few dozen, perhaps a hundred, of these applicants, and there are no statistics on this, since most of those concerned have emigrated (bnt is aware, however, of two successful applications under Section 15(4) StAG within Germany, both of which concerned children who left Berlin between 1938 and 1939 for England or Palestine, one of them a Pole, the other a citizen of the Free City of Danzig/Gdansk, and whose descendants returned to Germany from England and Israel).
All in all, the Fourth Act to reform the StAG has drawn a positive response, notwithstanding the lingering issues as to the proper interpretation of e.g. Section 15 (3) and (4) StAG in some cases. These will be clarified in the administrative courts, but the rejection figures are overall very low. The BVA should certainly receive better staffing so that the applications which are now being received can be processed more quickly.