Obstacles in obtaining Latvian citizenship

By

Una Tukisa	Marina Teus

The rebirth of ethnic minorities in Latvia began in the late 1980s after some 50 years of repression. This advantage, in the renewal of ethnic minority life, was successfully utilised by ethnic Poles and Jews. At this time, the ethnic Russians were in a unique situation. On one hand, the advantage from the Soviet occupation remained not only during the late 1980s, but also continued into the 1990s, namely, the network of Russian language schools in Latvia, as well as wide use of Russian language in everyday life including radio and TV.

On the other hand, these advantages have hindered the development of the minority group consciousness and therefore have also hindered the ethnic Russian minority’s organisational development.

Each minority has chosen its own the most suitable and possible way of development. In one case the main emphasis has been on ethnic schools; in others on renewal of organisations; in still others on maintaining contacts with the ethnic homeland, as in case with Russians. Ethnic Russians until only recently saw the term "ethnic minority", if applied to them, as an insult. However, in the course the time changes do occur and, for example, in 1995 the Russian Society of Latvia Co-ordinating Consultative Council in its establishing agreement affirmed the idea of national cultural autonomy.

In the following part of the article Latvian Citizenship exam will be described briefly, moreover, the main obstacles of the becoming citizen will be investigated.

Citizenship

As in the rest of Europe, ethnic minorities in Latvia are formed and based upon citizenship. Immigrants and non-citizens become members of an ethnic minority only if they have obtained citizenship (see Table 1). The Russian proportion in the citizen population is slightly more than a half of their proportion within the total population. The main problem of faster integration, from Russians point of view, is Citizenship exam. It consists of 2 parts:

1. Latvian language exam

The main problem here is that during the Soviet era learning of Latvian was not necessary, therefore, people even living here for a long time do not speak, write or understand Latvian.

2. Test on history and constitution of Latvia

During Soviet Union times it was compulsory to learn only the history of Soviet Latvia. On the contrary, in the test of naturalisation, this part is almost excluded, what means that the history of Latvia should be learned from the very beginning. To relieve this process the Bureau of Naturalisation of Latvia published special edition of history and constitution of Latvia that contains necessary information and facts to pass the test.

But still there are some more obstacles in the naturalisation process.

The first thing is that for elder people it is hard to learn new language and remember plenty of facts and dates. It is very hard to prepare for the exam by his/herself, but attending language courses and obtaining necessary literature can cause additional expenses. That leads to the preference to stay non-citizen rather than spend scarce money resources or effort.

Then, there is a part of people, especially from lower layers of society, who cannot afford to pay naturalisation fee (about USD 55). This obstacle can mainly be observed among pensioners and families with low-income level. This fee sums up to about a half or even more of their total month income, so they are supposed either to save or to live a month nearly starving. This dilemma cuts their "way" to become citizens.

But the main problems concern those who do not want to pass the exams because of their principles. They either think that they had deserved citizenship of Latvia due to their permanent living or being born there, or are patriots of Russia and consider themselves as citizens of former Soviet Union, or do not see any advantages in becoming the citizens. The compulsory citizenship is only for some professions, namely, pharmacists, lawyers, firemen, doctors, policemen. If person is not employed in any of these particular professions, the only thing he/she loses is that he/she cannot take part in elections and referendums.

The thing why young men do not want to become citizens is that they do not have to do the military service if they are non-citizens. On the other hand, one of the disadvantages for being non-citizen is that it is very hard to exercise right to have private property, specifically land. All the other rights and obligations are almost the same for both - citizens and non-citizens. So, if the person is not affected by any of these problems, he/she even does not want to try to pass the exam.

Concerning Russia's patriots, they still believe that one day Latvia will be back in CIS (Commonvel of Independent States). The main part of this group consists of pensioners and ex-militaries. They do not believe in the State they live in, so why should they be its citizens?

Although, it should be admitted that it is almost impossible to distinguish the amount of people influenced by each of these issues.

Pensioners, for example, can refuse to pass the exam because of the lack of knowledge (language and history), lack of financial resources, and belief in former USSR, so they can be added to three different groups observed above in the article. Therefore, no precise or even approximate numbers can be given for each obstacle.

Government’s attitude towards minorities

As mentioned, Latvian Government recognises as minorities only those Russians who are citizens of the state. Although, Russians-citizens have the same rights and obligations as Latvian ones, State do not provide them special minority rights, what is a matter of fact that Latvia had not signed Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities.

So far all minorities were treated as ethnic, not national ones, what means that Latvia had not officially recognised any minority. However, unconsciously Latvia recognises Russians as minority - there are Russian schools budgeted by the state; TV programs and films in Russian; advertisements; in different state institutions staff speaks Russian with Russian speaking people, etc. But may be it is only the "leftovers" from the USSR times?