The Green Party is calling on the Associate Minister of Immigration to act immediately to prevent a New Zealand-born child from being potentially forced to leave the country just days before Christmas.
"This case exposes the harsh consequences of an immigration system that has failed to respond with humanity," says the Green Party's Immigration spokesperson, Ricardo Menéndez March.
"Aotearoa can be a country that leads with compassion, evidence and aroha. But this case highlights the lasting impact of the changes to New Zealand's citizenship law, which ended automatic birthright citizenship and left children born and raised here dependent on the immigration status of their parents, even when their lives are entirely rooted in Aotearoa.
"The Hidayat family-Andi, his wife Theresia, and their 11-year-old son Hogan-are preparing to leave Aotearoa next week after nearly two decades living, working, and raising their family in Auckland, with no viable pathway to remain.
"New Zealand is the only country Hogan knows. He was born here, raised here, goes to school here, and this is the only home he has ever known. He has the potential of a bright future in football ahead of him and has the support of his local community and football legend Wynton Rufer.
"That a New Zealand-born child could be denied not just a Kiwi Christmas, but a future in the only country he has ever known, is a damning indictment of this Government's immigration settings.
"Instead of a humane solution, the family has been subjected to impossible and disproportionate evidential demands that bear no relation to their life in New Zealand.
"This Christmas, the Minister still has the power to do the right thing. No child should be forced to leave the only country they know. Every Kiwi kid deserves a Kiwi Christmas-and a future in Aotearoa," says Ricardo Menéndez March.
- A formal request for ministerial intervention has now been submitted to the Office of Associate Immigration Minister Chris Penk, asking him to act in the best interests of a New Zealand-born child and to grant the family residency and the certainty they have been denied for nearly two decades.
