Do Prime Ministers/Presidents/Chancellors,etc. in other countries have to be native to that country?

[raccoon]

As most of you undoubtedly know, the POTUS can't be a naturalized citizen.

I'm curious as to whether other countries have such laws. Especially Germany, as Hitler was Austrian.

[Spider Jerusalem]

1. Nope

the prime minister of Australia was born in the UK. And Andrew Bonar Law, who was British prime minister from the autumn of 1922 to the spring of 1923, was born in Canada. John Turner, who was PM of Canada briefly in the '80's, was born in the UK. (These examples are all of people born in Commonwealth countries becoming prime ministers of other Commonwealth countries though, I'm not entirely sure that qualifies as "foreign-born&quot .

[malaise]

2. Seaga was born in the US

His mother was Jamaican and his father was Lebanese-Jamaican. He renounced his US citizenship. We have had several court cases in recent times that removed people from office for having dual citizenship with non-Commonwealth countries.

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. Wikipedia list for presidents

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Requirements_for_becoming_a_president

Some have a birth requirement, but most just need nationality.

I'd expect most PMs/Chancellors to have the same requirements as members of parliament, and I think nearly everywhere would just require nationality for that (and, technically, not even that sometimes - eg the UK requires a British citizen or citizen of a Commonwealth country or the Republic of Ireland, though they do need to swear an oath of allegiance to the queen and her successors to speak or vote in parliament, so some non-citizens might not be willing to do that (just as the Sinn Fein MPs aren't)).

[LeftishBrit]

4. There are no formal rules of this sort about Prime Ministers of the UK

Last edited Thu Aug 2, 2012, 10:46 AM - Edit history (1)

Only one of our Prime Ministers was in fact born outside the UK. This was Andrew Bonar Law, who was born and spent much of his childhood in New Brunswick. This was a British colony at the time of his birth (though it became part of Canada shortly afterwards), which may possibly have made a difference to voters' attitudes to him - but there was no eligibility question.

The formal head of state is of course the Monarch; and a few of our kings and queens were born overseas, though none recently. Notably, George I came from Germany, and never even learned to speak English fluently.

Oddly enough, the rules are far more stringent about certain types of civil service employment. A person cannot hold senior posts in the Foreign Office unless not only they but both their parents were born in the UK. Ironically this would exclude, for example, Prince Charles.

[muriel_volestrangler]

5. I hope that's "the UK", not "England", for the Foreign Office posts ... (nt)

[LeftishBrit]

7. It is the UK of course and I've changed it accordingly

I was thinking of the reasons why much of my family could not get such a post, and as we live in England, wrote it like that. Sorry!

Even a Tory government would not ban Scots or Welsh from such posts (though there are some who I suspect would love to exclude everyone outside southern England specifically!)

[pampango]

6. Not in Canada.

In order to run for Prime Minister of Canada, you do NOT need to be born into Canadian Citizenship. Four past prime ministers were born outside of Canada...

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/To_run_for_Prime_Minister_do_you_have_to_be_born_in_Canada_or_just_a_Canadian_citizen