Wednesday 20 July 2022

Renunciation of Malaysian Citizenship (Stage 3)

So I returned to the High Commission of Malaysia to submit my documents.

Documents To Be Submitted:

1) Borang K ( Yellow Form) - 2 Sets (duly filled) 

2) Form (MY-RN1) 

3) Letter of Approval from ICA Singapore - Original & 2 photocopies

4) Malaysian I.C / Temporary Malaysian I.C - Original & 2 photocopies

5) Singapore Pink I.C / National Service I.C / Permanent Resident I.C - Original & 2 photocopies

6) Malaysian / Singapore Birth Certificate - Original & 2 photocopies

NOTE: Applicant who was born in Singapore is required to produce:-

i) Borang W (Malaysian Citizenship Certificate) ; OR - Original & 2 photocopies

ii) Pengesahan Taraf (Confirmation of Status) issued by Malaysian National Registration

Department; OR - Original & 2 photocopies

iii) Perakuan Taraf (Certificate of Status) issued by Malaysian Immigration Department

- Original & 2 photocopies

7) Applicant who was born before 31 August 1957, - Original & 2 photocopies

(Malaysian Citizenship Certificate)

8) Singapore Citizenship Certificate & Passport, - Original & 2 photocopies

(If applicable)

9) Malaysian International Passport - Original

10) Three (3) recent passport - size photograph - White Background

Note: i) All photocopies of documents must be in A4 size paper;

ii) Forms to be hand-written or typed. Mistakes to be cancelled neatly. Do not use Tipp-ex;

iii) Original Malaysian birth certificate to be laminated before submission;

iv) To photocopy front and back of Singapore Citizenship Certificate;

v) Applicant who do not have Borang 'W' / Pengesahan Taraf must produce 2

photocopies of parents' documents ie: identity card, birth certificate, citizenship certificate,

passport and marriage certificate

vi) Processing will take three (3) working days

vii) Registration fee SGD 10.00 (cash only)

viii) Additional documents may be required whenever needed

The bolded ones were the ones I had to pay attention to or submit. Do take note of the time for submission and collection:

Submission of application: Monday - Friday: 8.15 am - 11.30 am

Collection : 2.30 pm - 4.00pm


I reached at about 8.30am and this was the queue that greeted me


My younger sister was surprised. She said only 2 or 3 people were there when she went to submit her documents about a year ago. I commented that perhaps Covid makes people think harder about what they want in life.

The lady behind me said that she had been in Singapore for 27 years before she decided to convert. She's married with a 20-year-old daughter and her siblings and parents are living in Malaysia so it took her so long to decide to change. In my heart, I was thinking: ya man, people have valid reasons not to convert. What reason do I have not to convert? None of my family is in Malaysia. Don't know what the fish I have been thinking about! I literally was just born there and have nothing to do with Malaysia at all. I know nuts about Malaysia, its history, its language, its culture and its people. I don't even have Malaysian friends! I am just about the only Malaysian I know besides my own relatives. What identity am I talking about? I don't have a Malaysian identity besides that bit of Malaysian accented Mandarin only when I speak to my own family members. And it's not even half as strong as a native Malaysian. Nobody could tell I am a Malaysian if I don't tell them about it since we learnt to code-switch between Singapore-accent Mandarin and Malaysian-accent Mandarin since young. Yes, all these literally went through my mind after the lady spoke to me.

So I continued to queue till a man at a cart outside the Consular Office asked me to show him my documents. He checked through them, took out the extra copies that were not needed and put my thumbprints on the documents and asked me to return to the queue to get a number.

When I entered the office, I proceeded to get a queue number and waited again. There were about 20 people in front of me.

When my number was displayed on the LCD screen, I went forward to submit my documents and I was asked to wait to make my payment and get the date for collection at another counter. The wait to pay was quite fast, about 10 minutes. I was given a pink collection slip and asked to come back 3 days later.

Collection will be 3 working days later between 2.30 pm and 4.00pm. 

If you are not able to make it, you could write a letter and pass the pink collection slip to your family member to authorise him or her to collect it, or come on another day other than the given date to collect it. There is no need to give your IC or any form of identification to your family member for the collection.

All in all, I spent 2.5 hours (8.30am to 11am) at the High Commission of Malaysia just to submit the documents for the Renunciation. 

Aside from the submission of documents, I actually met the couple I sold my flat to at the embassy! What are the odds of that happening? They were just a number right before me at the counter. I thought they looked like the couple but I dismissed my thought as I didn't think it could be that coincidental. Then when the guy saw me, with my mask on no less, he smiled at me! They were not there to renounce their citizenship. Instead, they were there to register their marriage as Malaysians.

It's as if a message to tell me that everything was 'predestined', that everything happened in its good time. 

I returned 3 working days later at about 3pm to collect a white document ('Application for Renunciation of Malaysian Citizenship (Processing only)') that I had previously filled up for the purpose of showing to ICA that I had submitted my documents for renunciation. It states that I will only be able to collect my original birth cert and other documents 8 months later when the embassy sends me an email to inform me about it. 

There was no waiting this time. I just proceeded to the Consular Office where I had submitted my documents to and the guy at the counter gestured for me to go to him and he exchanged my pink collection slip with the white document.

So my next step to Singapore Citizenship is attending the ICA appointment.

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