The vice chairman of the Committee for Overseas Vietnamese in HCMCity

, Nguyen Viet Thuan, has spoken about procedures to get certificates of blood-relationship:

- Since January 1, 2006, the Committee for Overseas Vietnamese in HCMCity has been in charge of issuing the “Certificate of Vietnamese nativity for overseas Vietnamese”. This helps encourage overseas Vietnamese to invest in the homeland. Overseas Vietnamese can also contact Vietnamese agencies abroad to ask about applying for certificates.

- In principle, an overseas Vietnamese has to directly hand in a file to obtain a certificate. In the file must be proof of his or her Vietnamese blood-relationship (or document that can replace passport), papers showing he or she to be a native of Vietnam (such as birth certificate, ID card, family record book).

If one does not have any of the required papers, he or she must be legally attested to by two natives of Vietnam (relatives, cousins).

In case one does not directly present papers, he or she must give a valid proxy to another to hand in.

Time for approval and fees

- This certificate is often used by overseas Vietnamese who would like to set up firms or invest into Vietnam.

Since the Law on Investment was ratified by the National Assembly and came into effect on July 1, 2006, overseas Vietnamese establishing companies and investing in the homeland do not need this certificate. However, if such a one still wants to possess this certificate, the committee will issue it.

Time for issuing this certificate at present is between 7 and 10 days or 5 days on average. In case of need, the committee can issue it in one day. This service is free of charge.

Source: Thanhnien

Translated by Mai Huong