even temporary visitors are taxed. The Duty to Respect the National Flag and the National Anthem: This duty is imposed on citizens by section 4(2)(b) of the Constitution. But non-citizens are expected to show similar respect. When the rights and obligations that constitute citizenship are analysed, therefore, it can be seen that there is little difference between citizens and non-citizens except in regard to voting in national elections — and even there, not all citizens are allowed the vote and in the past even non-citizens have been allowed to vote. The issues of who should be given citizenship under the new constitution, and whether dual citizenship should be allowed, must be viewed in this light. We now turn to examine those issues, as well as the further issue of whether citizens should be allowed to hold dual citizenship. Who Should be Given Citizenship Under the New Constitution? Existing Citizens: Obviously, everyone who is a citizen of Zimbabwe before the new constitution comes into force must continue to be one afterwards. This is a point that was ignored when the citizenship provisions of the present Constitution were replaced by Amendment No. 19. Existing rights of citizenship were not preserved, thereby throwing into doubt the citizenship of all prior citizens from President Mugabe downwards. Such an absurd result cannot have been intended, but it shows how important it is for the new Constitution to preserve existing rights. Citizens by birth: Everyone born in Zimbabwe should be a citizen by birth under the new constitution, irrespective of the nationality of his or her parents. The only restriction might be that at least one of the parents should be lawfully resident in the country. This would avoid the possibility of people coming here from another country to have a child, just so that the child can be a citizen of this country (which happens regularly in the United States). It is important to ensure that children born in this country are not stateless, because although Zimbabwe is not a party to the UN Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, it is a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which states in article 24.3 that every child has a right to nationality. Moreover, the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child requires member states to ensure that their constitutional legislation provide for children to be accorded the nationality of the States in whose territory they are born if they have no other nationality (see article 6.4 of the Charter). Under our current law a child could be left stateless if neither of the child’s parents is a citizen of Zimbabwe and the child does not acquire citizenship of another country through them (which could quite easily be the case – a citizen by descent usually cannot pass citizenship on to his children). Citizens by descent: A person born outside Zimbabwe, either of whose parents is a citizen of Zimbabwe, should be a citizen by descent. Citizens by registration: Citizenship by registration should be available to anyone who has lawfully resided in Zimbabwe for a minimum qualifying period. The qualifying period should not be excessive; five years is more than sufficient (this is the period currently laid down in the Citizenship of Zimbabwe Act). Clearly there must be other qualifications, such as a clean criminal record, not being a burden on the State, and so on. Provided the candidate meets the requirements, he 18