Namibia · Residency by investment
Permanent Residence (section 26, Immigration Control Act 1993)
Effectively frozen. In Immigration Selection Board v Knoche [2025] NAHCMD 180 (17 April 2025), the court found that the Board had applied a fixed assets test with no basis in law, and ordered the Board to issue the permit. Execution of that order was then stayed pending a Supreme Court appeal, and the Ministry used the stay to suspend all permanent residence decisions. Reportedly around 55 applications are stuck, some for 18 months.
Namibian PR is the only gateway to a naturalisation clock that actually runs. That makes the current freeze more than an inconvenience. It has stopped the only viable long-term path into the country. Even when the freeze lifts, naturalisation requires giving up every other citizenship you hold.
Qualifying routes
There is no statutory qualifying residence period. Section 26(6) allows applicants to apply while still in the country.
The facts
- Total landed cost
- Official fees are modest. The real cost is an indefinite wait, and likely litigation.
- Route type
- Residency by investment
- Timeline
- 1.5–5 years (Decisions have been frozen since April 2025, pending the Supreme Court appeal. There is no reliable timeline for when they will resume.)
- Physical presence
- Once granted, PR lapses if you are absent for more than 2 years. This is the reverse of a qualifying period, and it is the source of the widely repeated, and incorrect, two-year rule.
- Family
- Spouse and dependent children
- Permanent residency
- This is the permanent residence status.
- Citizenship
- Naturalisation requires 10 years' continuous ordinary residence. Only time spent on PR counts toward this, not time spent on a permit.
- Language test
- There is no statutory language test.
- Dual citizenship
- Not permitted. You would have to renounce.
- Requirements
- application to the Immigration Selection Boardgood charactermeans of supportno statutory residence period prescribed
- Decisions are frozen. Filing now buys a place in a queue that is not moving, pending a Supreme Court appeal with no listed hearing date.
- There is no statutory qualifying period. The commonly cited five-year rule does not exist. The two-year figure people repeat is the lapse rule for absences, not an eligibility test.
- The Immigration Selection Board has broad discretion. Courts have repeatedly found that discretion abused. Budget for judicial review as a normal cost of this route, not as an exception.
- Naturalisation takes 10 years, not 5. The Constitution Second Amendment Act 7 of 2010 raised Article 4(5)(b) from 5 to 10 years, and raised the marriage route from 2 to 10. Namibia's own Permanent Mission to the UN was still publishing the pre-2010 text when we checked. It looks official, but it is out of date.
- Section 5(1)(g) requires an applicant to be willing to renounce the citizenship of any foreign country. Section 5(8) makes the grant absolutely discretionary, with no reasons given and no appeal allowed. Section 7(1)(a) then strips Namibian citizenship from a naturalised citizen who later voluntarily acquires another nationality. For a multi-citizenship family, that is disqualifying.
- Namibian-born children are constitutionally protected under Article 4(8) and may hold dual citizenship freely. The restriction only affects the naturalising parent.