Summary
Edward Keith-Roach, a chief administrator in Jerusalem, who in Banko’s account opposed the two-year residency requirement for naturalisation in Palestine as an unjustified advantage for Jewish immigrants and suggested proportional representation as a better electoral basis (The Invention of Palestinian Citizenship, 1918–1947, PDF p.59 / printed p.48).
Details
- Keith-Roach opined that the two years’ residency requirement for naturalisation would be abused by Jewish immigrants who wanted British protection and not Palestinian nationality; he gave examples of residency requirements in Great Britain and its Dominions, the United States, Switzerland, Belgium, France and Italy, all requiring at least five years, maintained that Jews in Palestine with a two-year qualification would have been greatly advantaged, and pointed out the Arabs would give a ‘tremendous howl’ that a Jewish individual from Europe could become a citizen of Palestine in two years (PDF p.59 / printed p.48).
- Some officials such as Keith-Roach suggested proportional representation was a better electoral basis than the communal system of secondary electors in the 1922 order; others deemed it too complicated and argued Arabs lacked knowledge of self-government due to high illiteracy rates (PDF p.53 / printed p.42).
Related pages
The Invention of Palestinian Citizenship, 1918–1947, Palestine Citizenship Order-in-Council 1925, Palestine Order-in-Council 1922