Madagascar's Karana people still awaiting nationality
| Publisher | UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) |
| Author | Markku Aikomus |
| Publication Date | 9 November 2017 |
| Cite as | UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Madagascar's Karana people still awaiting nationality, 9 November 2017, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/5a0aa3894.html [accessed 1 November 2019] |
Since he was 15, Ibrahim Ickbal, a 50-year-old father of two, has worked in the same jewellery shop in the city of Mahajanga, on Madagascar's northern coast. Although he barely earns enough to rent the two-room house he shares with his wife and children, he considers himself lucky to have a job of any kind.
Ibrahim belongs to Madagascar's Karana community, an ethnic minority group. Although his family arrived in Madagascar from India more than a century ago, Ibrahim does not possess Malagasy nationality. Like a significant portion of the Karana in Madagascar, and like his father before him, he is stateless.
While there are no exact figures, UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, estimates that there are currently millions of people around the world who lack any nationality. The majority belong to ethnic, religious, or linguistic minorities.
When Madagascar won independence from France in 1960, most Karana were not given citizenship. Until recently, Madagascar's nationality law only granted citizenship to children born to at least one parent with Malagasy nationality, meaning that statelessness was often passed from one generation to the next. The Karana are thought to number at least 20,000 and while some manage to run successful businesses, without access to education and formal employment, many others live in poverty.
Despite living in Madagascar for generations, stateless Karana must obtain residency permits to remain in the country legally. Recently, Ibrahim had to take out a loan from his employer in order to pay for a new biometric residence permit. "With my modest salary, it will take two years to pay back the loan," he said. "This has been an enormous financial investment, and I still cannot vote or travel."
Ibrahim's new residency card describes his nationality as "undetermined".
Olivia Rajerison, 35, knows only too well how statelessness impacts the lives of thousands of people in Madagascar. She works as a lawyer for Focus Development Association, UNHCR's implementing partner in Madagascar, assisting stateless people to access public education and health care. In addition, were it not for a recent change of the law, Olivia's own daughter would have been born without Malagasy nationality.
