Last updated on January 6th, 2022 at 01:06 pm
A foreign national residing in Nigeria who simply identified himself as Mr Andrew has lamented over the failure of Nigeria’s government to grant him citizenship despite her marriage to a Nigerian lady.
According to him, he has been residing in Nigeria for close to five years said he would have to leave Nigeria in few months time as his documents are due for renewal.
He said he’s a building engineer who had his wedding with a Nigerian woman in July 2018 shared his experience via his Twitter account.
He questioning Nigeria’s law that does not provide the same privileges to non-Nigerian men who seek to obtain citizenship by registration.
“I may have to leave Nigeria for a few months because of the absurd law that I can’t use my Wife’s nationality to gain citizenship because she’s a woman. Yet if I were a Nigerian man. Marrying her would grant her the ability to gain citizenship here. Second class women. And my contract is nearly over and I will need a new expatriate quota for my residency here.” he tweeted.
How to obtain Nigerian citizenship
According to Nigeria’s constitution, someone like Andrew can become a citizen of Nigeria by naturalisation.
Meaning, he is expected to have lived in Nigeria continuously for a period of twelve months, and during the period of twenty years immediately preceding that period of twelve months has resided in Nigeria for periods amounting in the aggregate to not less than fifteen years.
