Do I have Polish citizenship?

my father was polish and my mother english can i claim polish citizenship and how do i go about it?

Check this thread
Dual citizenship: Polish and American

go to the consulate/ambassy and ask away. they are the ones who would know for sure.

You have to apply for Confirmation of your Polish Citizenship. Long and complicated procedure..

If you do qualify for Polish citizenship, the steps you will have to go through if you are going to do this in London are: get hold of an original copy of your father's birth certificate, get hold of an original copy of your birth certificate and get it translated into Polish by a court registered translator, send your father's & your translated birth certificate to Warsaw and get them to issue you an "official" Polish birth certificate, apply for & obtain citizenship from the Wojewoda in Warsaw (the consulate helps you with both of these steps), submit your new Polish birth certificate + the confirmation of citizenship + a CV (in Polish) + 2 photos of you in profile so that your right ear shows + the fee and then wait for them to issue you the passport.

I think you may also have to have your parents marriage registered in Poland and get a Polish marriage certificate issued before they will give you a Polish birth certificate or recognise you as a Polish citizen (as my Mum did - they were married in the US) so your parents may have to go through those steps themselves or give you power of attorney to do that on their behalf.

You don't have to give up your British passport, but once you have dual nationality you won't be able to rely on the British consulate for support should you get into trouble in Poland.

Good luck! It took me 14 months to go through this process and both my parents were Polish and I was able to travel to Warsaw every few months to enquire after progress. Luckily my Mum had gone through the process of registering their marriage a year or so before I started the application, even though she had had a Polish passport in the past but it expired just after they changed the rules, so having to go through all this paperwork made her very cross!

a CV? you gotta be kidding.. what does that have to do with wheather one qualifies for citizenship?

and they are way anal about the pictures so make sure you have them snapped by a polish photographer who does them a lot.

Can I put in for Polish citizenship? All of my great grandparents came from Poland. The hard part will be getting the proof.

no proof, no pudding.

what percentage of my background has to be Polish? I can find it but it will take time

'fraid not!


the chemist round the corner from the Polish consulate does photos and knows exactly how they need to be

It's not really a CV, it's more a family history where you present who, when and why immigrated from Poland. The process is usually this long because it goes through Consulate, but you can skip the Consulate and apply directly in Poland without traveling there to check the status of your application!!!!