Lalit Modi’s Vanuatu citizenship seems to be in trouble after the Prime Minister of Vanuatu, Jotham Napat, told the Citizenship Commission on Monday to cancel his Vanuatu passport. This follows days after Modi applied to the Indian High Commission in London to give up his Indian passport. “I have instructed the Citizenship Commission to immediately begin proceedings to cancel Mr. Modi’s Vanuatu passport,” Napat said in a statement.
In an official media release by the Republic of Vanuatu, Napat said that following the recent revelations by the media, he ordered the Citizenship Commission to cancel Lalit Modi’s Vanuatu passport. The statement further added that the PM was made aware that the Interpol rejected Indian authorities’ requests twice in 24 hours, to issue an alert notice on Modi due to lack of substantive judicial evidence and that any such alert would have led to an automatic rejection of Modi’s citizenship application.
He explained that a Vanuatu passport is a privilege, not a right, and applicants need to give valid reasons to get citizenship. Napat also said that trying to avoid extradition is not a valid reason for citizenship, and that the recent evidence suggests that this was Modi’s intention.
Napat added that in the past few years, the Vanuatu government has made its citizenship by investment program stricter, leading to more applications being rejected by their financial intelligence unit.
The statement said that the new process of getting the citizenship now includes checks by three different agencies, including verification by Interpol.
(More details on this awaited)