Say someone comes to your country to ask for political asylum. In order to get it there a few criteria provided by law that you need to meet. These criteria are pretty straightforward and leave no room for discussion. Among them: your real name, real date of birth, the country you come from is on a list of countries that are known to violate human rights and you should apply for political asylum in the first country in which you arrived when you fled your own country. These are the rules and they are pretty simple, right? So on the premises of the information you give you are recognized as an asylum seeker and after a while you apply for citizenship, get a job and even become an outspoken politician and highly public figure.
Then, you admit – in public, on TV and in magazines – that you lied about your real name, age, and the fact that this was not the first country you came too and that in fact you didn’t even came from a country that was on any list as being dangerous. All in all very big lies.
Under normal circumstances this would have been political suicide and your citizenship would have been revoked and you would have been put on the first plain out of the country since you came here under false pretences. The law applies to you just as it does to all others. Right?
Well, no. Not in the case of (Ex-)Dutch (ex-)politician Ayaan Hirsi Ali – or as her real name is: Ayaan Hirsi Magan. Controversial from the second she entered the Dutch political area, now her role in Dutch politics is over.
Ali came to the Netherlands in 1992. She requested political asylum here and received a residence permit. Technically, since her first stop had been Germany, she should have applied for asylum there (such is the law). In the Netherlands she gave a different date of birth and different name to the Dutch immigration authorities. Until now she is known in the west by that name Hirsi Ali, instead of her real name Hirsi Magan. She lied to the immigration authorities that she had come straight from Somalia, instead of Kenya where she had been living for eleven years.
In Somalia there was a serious famine at that time and a civil war leading to the Operation Restore Hope by the United States. Due to these circumstances asylum seekers from Somalia were routinely granted asylum on humanitarian grounds. Kenya on the other hand was perfectly safe and no one should pretent it was or is otherwise.
Now, in 2002 when Ali became a member of the VVD party, she admitted to her lies. She did so on Dutch TV and several interviews. So it was a well established fact.
Now fast forward to 2006. It is a year before elections for Dutch parliament and there is a fierce political struggle going on within the VVD party about the leadership.
For whatever reason the Dutch television program “Zembla” tells once again about the fact that in her asylum request, Hirsi Ali lied about her real name, her age and the country she arrived from. The documentary also reports that she made up a story that she had fled an arranged marriage in Somalia. Members of Ms Hirsi Ali’s family told the Zembla television programme that they had no knowledge of an arranged marriage. The rogramme also questions her claims that she fled wartorn Somalia: she lived in a comfortable family home in Kenya for 12 years before she sought refugee status in the Netherlands in 1992.
After this media speculations arises that she could lose her Dutch Citizenship because of this ‘identity fraud’, rendering her ineligible for Parliament. In a first reaction VVD Minister Rita Verdonk (who is in a battle for the leadership of the VVD) says she would not look into the matter, but after Member of Parliament Hilbrand Nawijn insists, she declares that she will investigate Hirsi Ali’s naturalisation process.
This investigation starts on last Friday (May 12th) and takes three days. Verdonk’s findings are that Hirsi Ali never received Dutch citizenship after all, because she lied about her name and date of birth. She stated that she was Ayaan Hirsi Ali, born in 1967, but she’s actually Ayaan Hirsi Magan, born in 1969. Therefore the Dutch government’s position is that Hirsi Ali’s Dutch citizenship is invalid and declared null and void.
Over the weekend Ali dismissed the political furore. “Have they all gone mad? Yes, I did lie to get asylum in Holland. This is public knowledge since at least September 2002,” she told the Associated Press.
Hirsi Ali became one of our country’s most prominent politicians after denouncing radical Islam. She became famous internationally after writing the screenplay for a film which featured naked women with verses from the Koran painted on their bodies. Theo Van Gogh, the film’s director and a close friend of Ali, was murdered by a radical Islamist.
Ali regularly criticised the treatment of Muslim women and attacked the Netherlands’ liberal immigration policies. With her Muslim background, which she has renounced, Ms Hirsi Ali was an influential figure as the Netherlands debated the integration of Muslim immigrants.
So the questions that arise around this case are many.
For instance: why did Immigration Minister Rita Verdonk – or the Dutch Immigration service for that matter – wait until 2006 before acting on this information that has been public since 2002?
Well, for starters Rita Verdonk, is our immigration minister and hopes to be the VVD’s candidate for prime minister in next year’s general election. She is a hardliner when it comes to immigration.
Just last month she took the decision to expel Kosovo schoolgirl Taida Pasic and to refuse accelerated naturalisation to Feyenoord’s Salomon Kalou. Pasic, 18, had to leave the Netherlands without completing her schooling here because she made improper use of the procedure to request a residence permit.
The case was highly controversial. Verdonk’s spokesperson publicly branded Pasic as a fraud for returning to the Netherlands on a tourist visa after accepting EUR 7,000 to continue her schooling in Kosovo. Pasic’s family lived as refugees in the Netherlands
until they agreed to repatriation.
She also made a controversial decision in the case of soccerplayer Kalou who plays for Feyenoord Rotterdam and the Dutch football association wanted him to appear for Holland in the World Cup in Germany this June. The Minister rejected his application for accelerated naturalisation. Kalou failed an integration exam in November 2005 and the Minister wants to see proof he intends to settle permanently in the Netherlands.
So, given these other highly public cases her decision to take away Ali’s Dutch Citizenship because of her ‘identity fraud’ seems only natural.
Except for her timing.
Even though I think it is the right decision, I think her timing is very bad to say the least. Right now she really made the impression that she took the decision because of (personal) political reasons.
Today there is a big debate about this case in Dutch parliament and the outcome remains to be seen.
As far as Hirsi Ali goes: she resigned today and is likely to move to the United States where she will work for the conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute.
However, if I was part of the Institute I would not know if I would want a obvious ‘fraud’ to work for my institute.
Bottomline: I think Ali should be ashamed of herself and it is good she resigned – no matter what her personal merits are: the law also applies to her. On the other hand: this should have been done in 2002 and not now. The timing has all the makings of a political decision. And that certainly is a bad motive.