Birth certificates must have race, ethnicity

Sri Lanka can never progress, for there are too many “pundits” who enjoy upsetting society while promoting sponsored notions. Each government and its stooges are guilty of this. The decision to exclude race (ethnic identity) in birth certificates was reversed in 2020 and has now re-emerged.

Every change always ends up chopping something or the other. Thus, the birth certificate removed the provision for parents being married, claiming it prejudiced some children – as though a major percentage of Sri Lanka’s children were illegitimate! The justification for bizarre changes is that it is keeping to “international standards”, which is just an eyewash, as all foreign birth certificates have a checkbox for race/ethnicity.

In February 2022, the Court of Appeal heard arguments to replace all races with “Sri Lankan” in birth certificates. In 2018, attorney Nuwan Bopage registered his first son’s birth by not filling in the race. This was due to an error by the department. He was not allowed to do the same for his second son, claiming it was mandatory that the field be filled. It may be the individual’s right not to profess his race, but individual rights cannot overrule official and mandatory requirements of the State to include race/ethnicity. Besides, how can a father determine if the baby should not have race/ethnicity included? That is for the child to decide when they come of age.

How many would think like Bopage? Every country includes race/ethnicity in some form of official document. There are set standards that are accepted and do not change just because people pluck numerous notions and theories out of the air from time to time. Denouncing one’s race means a person wishes to embrace another, or remain without a race – that entails not belonging to any race. There is no such thing as a Sri Lankan identity, as the term Sri Lanka or Sri Lankan emerged only in 1972, after the Republican Constitution was adopted. The history of the Sri Lankan identity is just 50 years old – that’s hardly a national identity. Why give a name to a person then – if that too is looked at as a problem?

While there are modern rights and demands emerging where LGBTQ+ persons claim the inclusion of their identities, there are some who wish to have their formal identities such as race/ethnicity/religion removed, but they are silent about the inclusion of new identities!

Birth certificates and race in the US
Race appears in both birth and death certificates in the US. New parents have to fill a questionnaire stating the race of both mother and father. The US claims racial data is for demographic, statistical, and health purposes.

America has five race categories:

• Whites (who have origins in Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa)
• American Indian/Alaskan Natives (who have their origins among any of the native people and maintain tribal affiliation in North America/Central America/South America
• Black or African Americans (who have origins in black-racial groups of Africa)
• Asians (who have origins among people in the Far East/Southeast Asia/Indian subcontinent, including Cambodia, China, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam)
• Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islanders (who have origins to the people of Hawaii, Guam, Samoa, and other Pacific Islands)

The inclusion of race and ethnicity follows the 1997 Office of Management and Budget standards on race and ethnicity.

Birth certificates and race in the UK

The UK demands the ethnicity of a person to be included in birth and death registrations as per the 2001 census classification criteria. The same applies to marriage as well. All minority ethnic communities other than White British are defined in the 2001 census. The UK has 16 ethnic categories listed since this census.

The UK deems the recording of country of birth as a poor indicator of ethnicity, as many ethnic minorities have been born in the UK.

Like the US, the UK claims the inclusion of ethnicity is for health information. National Health Services include the ethnicity of birth in hospital charts.

The UK is using the Covid-19 pandemic to justify recording ethnicity on death certificates as well, and it is now mandatory to include the ethnicity on death certificates.

Birth registration in Australia
Without a birth certificate, the benefits of citizenship poses a problem. Without a birth certificate, it is impossible to obtain a driving licence, passport, or tax file number. Schools will not enrol students without a birth certificate. Sports clubs will not allow members to engage in competitions if the age cannot be proved.

Due to such reasons, Australia’s indigenous children are the most vulnerable and face difficulties in proving their rights.

Article 33 of the The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) states that the indigenous people have the right to determine their own identity.

To avoid such situations, the majority of countries across the globe include race/ethnicity in birth, death and marriage certificates, or some alternate form of official documentation.

We again hear of calls to remove race/ethnicity in birth certificates. There is a civilisational heritage that Sri Lanka has every right to continue, and take pride in. Modern thinkers and a handful of people who wish to not defend the nation and live as gipsies with no identity cannot impose their thinking on this right. While they may choose to live without an identity, and claim to not belong to anything or anyone, they cannot impose their will on all others.

That historical identity of the nation came under threat by traitors who ceded the nation and its identity to foreign invaders and their rule. As those pseudo-secularism notions funded by foreign non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are partly responsible for the current trend of thinking, policymakers must not be naïve to fall for such googlies.

If a handful of people wish to not have any identity and attachment to anything or anyone, they cannot prevent those that do from continuing the proud national heritage and history surrounding the “rata, jathiya, agama” (nation, race, religion) theme.

It was not those people who do not have a nationality, a race, or a religion, that built this nation. It was those who were proud of their “jathiya” and “jathikathwaya” who built this nation. Let no one forget this. Those who wish to have no “jathiya”, no “jathikathwaya” cannot dictate how a nation should move forward. Such people have nothing to defend as they are people living without a cause or a reason.

A nation is protected by people who love everything in it, everything about it, and everything that makes them take pride in it. These defence lines are not easy to defeat. That is why there are a bunch of gypsies who have been set free to come up with notions to destroy the key pillars and elements that hold the nation together.

Not only birth certificates, but the national identification, passports, marriage and death certificates should include race/ethnicity. These are important elements that cannot be erased to satisfy a handful of people’s whims and fancies, most often which are part of sponsored initiatives to erase the history of nations. Today the nation state system is under threat – part of the programme to remove the system is to denationalise natives, and to do so there are well-funded initiatives emerging, such as removing ethnicity/race from birth certificates, etc.

These are all well-planned and well-choreographed, and have ulterior motives. Freedoms and rights connote to removing historical heritage and embracing the new rights that align with modern geopolitical agendas and false value systems that are meant to keep the people who embrace such busy people confused about who they are.

The resolution adopted by the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), namely UNGA A/HRC/27/22, related to the birth registration and right of everyone to recognition as a person before the law concludes the following:

• Birth registration is a fundamental right, as per Article 24 of ICCPR and Article 7 of Convention on the Rights of the Child
• Registration must also include nationality of both parents
• Birth registration upholds the right of everyone to recognition as a person before the law which is a universal human right
• The Convention on the Rights of the Child stipulates that a child should be registered immediately after birth, and has a right to a name, and a right to a nationality
• The Human Rights Council also upholds the right to nationality in the birth registration

A birth registration is a “passport” for rights – vote, marriage, formal employment, drivers’ licence, open bank accounts, access to social security, pension, health, insurance, migration, line of credit, register one’s own children’s births, secure inheritance, property, demographic and census purposes, budgets and allocations, social welfare, etc.

Authorities should continue the system without removing race/ethnicity from birth certificates. We want to nurture citizens who have nationalism and pride in them, not a bunch of identity-less gypsies that do not want to belong anywhere.

 (The writer is an independent political analyst who writes on a broad range of topics, and was previously the International Human Rights Commission’s Goodwill Ambassador for Sri Lanka)

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect those of this publication.

By Shenali D. Waduge

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