Åkesson: Loyalty declaration should be a requirement for citizenship

This week, the Tidö government presented stricter requirements for obtaining Swedish citizenship. One point that the Sweden Democrats wanted to include, but which the investigator rejected, is that new citizens should make a declaration of loyalty to the nation. According to SD leader Jimmie Åkesson, the party will continue to fight for such a requirement to be implemented.

It was on Tuesday that Minister for Migration Johan Forssell (M) and investigator Kirsi Laakso Utvik presented the proposals for stricter citizenship requirements.

Forssell stated that citizenship will no longer be granted without requirements, and immigrants must adapt to Swedish values.

However, a declaration of loyalty to Sweden was not included in Kirsi Laakso Utvik’s proposals, as it is claimed to be too expensive, complicated, and unnecessary. According to her, today’s voluntary municipal ceremonies are sufficient.

According to SD’s migration policy spokesperson Ludvig Aspling, while the ceremonial elements are pleasant, they do not constitute the core of the issue.

Not backing down

Despite the investigator’s assessment, Jimmie Åkesson has no plans to drop the issue and points out that there has been agreement in both the directives and the Tidö agreement.

The SD leader also does not believe that too much weight should be placed on individual investigators’ opinions.

“Investigating something in political language means that you want to implement something. I have a very hard time with the Swedish investigative or legislative system where political power is given to individuals to say ‘this seems good and this doesn’t seem good,’ despite having had general elections where voters have expressed their views,” he told Expressen.

Åkesson does not believe it is his place to answer how a possible declaration of loyalty to Sweden could look, but he thinks it is reasonable that if someone comes to Sweden and wants to become a citizen, they must meet certain requirements – including intending to be loyal to Sweden, something he considers incredibly important given the security policy situation.