Michael D Higgins (Galway West, Labour)
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Question 862: To ask the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform the position of cases (details supplied); and when these cases are expected to be processed. [11665/08]

Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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An application for a certificate of naturalisation from the person under the first file number referred to in the Deputy's Question was received in the Citizenship section of my Department in October 2006. Officials in that section are currently processing applications received in August 2005 and have approximately 7,400 applications on hand to be dealt with before that of the person concerned. These are generally dealt with in chronological order as this is deemed to be the fairest to all applicants. It is likely, therefore, that further processing of the application will commence in the first half of 2009. I will inform the Deputy and the person in question when I have reached a decision on the application. Officials in the Citizenship section inform me that there is no record of any application for naturalisation under the second file number referred to in the Deputy's question.