The 38-year-old works for a British fintech company, but all she wants is to care for her mother, Nabena Badalghe Hamalatha, in Malaysia due to the economic crisis in Sri Lanka.
However, she is unable to do so as she holds a Sri Lankan passport and is unable to obtain a long-term visa in Malaysia even though her mother is Malaysian.
Instead, Gayani can only visit Malaysia on a single-entry tourist visa.
The situation would have been different if Malaysia’s law allowed overseas-born children of Malaysian mothers to become citizens by operation of law.
“It’s heartbreaking that as the child of a Malaysian citizen, I still have to apply for a tourist visa to visit my motherland with my mother.
“It hurts on so many different levels,” she told FMT.
To rub salt in the wound, Gayani said that when she was working in Singapore, she was living on an employment pass which entitled her to a 12-month multiple-entry visa.
“I had more rights as someone with a Singaporean employment pass, than as a child of a Malaysian mother.”
Nabena, who prefers to live in Malaysia, previously injured her head when she fell in the bathroom at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. Gayani said is she unwilling to be separated from her mother – a diabetic – as she is worried her mother may fall again or that her health may deteriorate.
“I need to be able to rush her to the hospital,” she says, adding that she too desperately wants to return home due to the economic crisis in Sri Lanka.
‘I can’t be there if anything happens’
Emilia Ong is in the same quandary as Gayani, except that Emilia’s mother, Ong Poh Suan, returned to Malaysia 13 years ago and now lives alone.
As an only child of a divorced mother, it has become more urgent for the 41-year-old writer who resides in the UK to provide financial, emotional and physical support.
“If one day she doesn’t reply to my WhatsApp, I won’t know what happened. It’s tricky,” Emilia told FMT.
Desperate to stay with her 66-year-old mother in Malaysia, Emilia worked as an English teacher for six years even though teaching was not her main skill set.
“An employment visa through teaching was the only way I could stay long-term.
“I’m a creative person, but there’s no way for me to get an employment visa in the arts in Malaysia.”
Whenever Emilia visited her mother in Malaysia, even on a three-month tourist visa, she would have to leave her job or turn down job offers.
As adult children of Malaysian mothers, both Gayani and Emilia cannot apply to become citizens under Article 15(2) of the Federal Constitution.
Those over the age of 21 can only obtain citizenship via naturalisation under Article 19 of the constitution, which involves a more challenging process as they would have to obtain permanent residency.
The government is looking to amend the law to automatically confer citizenship to children born overseas to Malaysian mothers.
However, the current proposal only covers unborn children and will not benefit those already born overseas to Malaysian mothers.