Zimbabwean native advised to reapply for UK citizenship

February 05 2010 by Liam Clifford

A Belfast resident who previously renounced her Zimbabwean citizenship has been advised to reapply for permission to live in Northern Ireland after UK immigration officials took her British passport away from her.

Beatrice Alstrid Burnett acquired the passport using a false birth certificate in order to begin living and working in the UK.

In August 2008, it was confiscated by UK immigration officers at Belfast International Airport as she returned from visiting the US.

She then took the case for judicial review and lost at Belfast's Court of Appeal, prompting the appeal judge to recommend that she apply to the Zimbabwean authorities for assistance in getting her citizenship back.

The court heard that Burnett, who was working in the UK after finding a post with Belfast City Council through a recruitment agency in the city, made a passport application to the British High Commission in South Africa.

She admitted using a fake birth certificate to back up her claim that she was the daughter of a retired dentist born in Britain, thereby entitling her to a passport. According to her lawyer, she later found out from her family that he was not, in fact, her father.

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