Foreigners who wish to register their child in Malta have complained that they must “jump through hoops” to complete the process.
A young Brazilian couple said they were unable to register their child’s surname as they wished for weeks, complaining they were told to register the mother’s surname as the last when they wanted it first.
They have been trying to register their baby with the father’s surname coming after the mother’s surname, but the identity office has been “rejecting it”, a relative of the family told the Times of Malta.
“We are worried it will cause trouble back in Brazil because we might get asked questions at the airport,” the father, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said.
“It’s been a frustrating process.”
The couple, who moved to Malta in search of work, said they were looking forward to register their child in the country.
“We had long planned his name and we could not give it to him,” he said.
It has been a frustrating process
Brazilian families have worked around the rule by registering the mother’s surname as the second name of the child, he said. The father’s surname would then be registered as the only family name.
Still, the couple said, they did not want to change the name they wanted to give their child for months to simply “get around the rule”.
Asked about the matter, a spokesman for Identity Malta said he could not comment about the specific case without being given more details. However, he said that generally, the regulator made distinctions between children conceived in or out of wedlock and those who applied for the publication of banns.
According to the Civil Code, any “child conceived and born out of wedlock, if he has been acknowledged by the father, shall assume his surname, to which may be added the surname of the mother; otherwise, he shall assume the surname of the mother.”
Moreover, another article of the Civil Code provides that children conceived and born in wedlock to parents who applied for the publication of banns prior to September 2017, “shall take the surname of their father, after which there may be added, the maiden surname of the mother or the surname of her predeceased husband.”