Way to go morons

Trouble began when a television documentary by Zembla highlighted lies Ali had told about her name, age and how she had reached the Netherlands when she applied for asylum 14 years ago.

Hirsi Ali had admitted the falsifications in several media interviews since 2002 and also informed her party, the liberal-conservative VVD, before standing for parliament in 2003. But where the documentary seems to have hit her reputation hardest is in interviewing members of her family who contested her claim that she was fleeing a forced marriage when she arrived in the Netherlands aged 22.

The MP has previously explained not giving her real name, Ayaan Hirsi Magan, and saying she was born in 1967, not 1969, because she was afraid her family would find her. She also told officials she had come directly from Somalia, rather than via Kenya and Germany, thus accelerating her claim for asylum. However the documentary seems to have hit her reputation hardest is in interviewing members of her family who contested her claim that she was fleeing a forced marriage when she arrived in the Netherlands aged 22.

Verdonk said in May that the falsifications made her application for citizenship, granted in 1997, invalid. This month however, Verdonk wrote to the Dutch parliament saying she had found a loophole which made it legitimate for Ms Hirsi Ali to have used her grandfather's name in her asylum claim.