Hi all, I’m posting this on behalf of my son who is three months old. I’m trying to work out if it’s possible for him to have triple citizenship as I know the Dutch rules can be very strict re this.
For background, I am an Australian citizen and my husband is a dual Dutch/Canadian citizen. My husband was born in Holland to Dutch parents but moved to Canada as a child and became a naturalised Canadian citizen as an adult. He has since renewed his Dutch passport and maintains his dual citizenship under the “living somewhere for five years prior to turning 18” exception. So far, no issues.
We live in Australia (my home country) where my husband is now a Permanent Resident. Our son was born here in Australia and is a citizen. This brings us to the current predicament.
We would ideally like our son to have triple citizenship. He’s automatically an Australian, and it’s ridiculously easy for him to also get his Canadian citizenship by virtue of my husband having it. He also is eligible for Dutch citizenship through my husband since my husband has Dutch citizenship and we were married at the time of our son’s birth.
The issue we face is, if we apply for his Canadian citizenship, will that make him ineligible to also obtain his Dutch citizenship? My assumption is that he’s not ‘voluntarily’ obtaining it because he’s a minor and we’re obtaining it for him, so I’m hoping that means he can continue to hold all three as an adult and continually renew his Dutch passport every <13 years without issues, but I could be wrong. Is it best to get the Canadian citizenship after his Dutch or before, or does it not matter either way so long as he’s a minor when he obtains each?
Bonus question - if my husband obtains Australian citizenship one day through the ‘obtaining the nationality of your spouse’ exception, will that affect our son’s Dutch citizenship status or renewal, assuming he is still a minor when this happens?
Any advice would be much appreciated! I just want to give our son the best access to opportunities in all three countries since we have family in them all, but this is a bit of a minefield. I’ve scoured the Dutch government’s website but this is a very niche problem with no clear answer on it. Thanks all!