Comment by zaatar | Hacker News Reader

Comment by zaatar | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

One key thing to note is that Canadian Citizenship Law does not require the applicant to be present physically on Canadian soil while the application is being processed, nor does it require "proof of intent to live in Canada" for award of Citizenship.

What this means is that in theory, someone could land as a PR one Day 1, file the application exactly 3 years and 1 day later, and then leave Canada and go sit in a hut in Guatemala while the application is being processed. [1] After it is ready for the test/oath in 2-3 years, applicant flies back, declares a desire to live and die in Guatemala, and still gets his Canadian citizenship, a shiny new Canadian passport, and leaves the country. And all this is 100% legal, at least as per Canadian Citizenship Law as of 2013.

[1] Unfortunately, C&IC will only correspond to Canadian addresses, so the applicant does need a reliable mailing address in Canada

Theoretically yes, but in practice, the current Harper administration is going hard against those PRs who leave Canada after applying for citizenship, using any possible way to deny them, even questioning and trying to reverse decisions made by Citizenship Judges.

Good discussion here: https://secure.immigration.ca/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=8848... (see a post by dpenabill toward the end of the page), and the entire thread is good as well.

This is somewhat correct and quite possible. Keep in mind the reason that this is possible is because to maintain Canadian PR status the residency obligation is 2 physical years in Canada out of a 5 year period[1]. So if you are outside of Canada for 3 years, you'd have to come back for the final 2.

There is ambiguity about whether it's a rolling 5 years or whether it's 5 year cycles based on the date you first receive your PR status. To be safe, it's usually best to assume modulo 5 from the start of your PR status.

In the example above, if you filed the citizenship application 3 years and 1 day later, the maximum you can stay in your Guatemalan hut is just shy of 2 years, or else you risk losing PR status and jeopardizing your Canadian citizenship application.

[1] http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/newcomers/about-pr.asp#keep_sta...

I'm not sure what benefit this gets them though, other than being able to travel on a Canadian passport and receive help from Canadian embassies when abroad. It's not as though one gets access to Canadian social programs when overseas.

Possible reasons: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadians_of_convenience

(Having no dog in this hunt as I'm not Canadian nor do I have any claim on Canadian citizenship or permanent residence, much as I'd like to.)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com