That has to be a new speed record. In Switzerland, we are told, "foreigners with no direct blood ties to Switzerland through either birth or marriage must live in the country for at least 12 years before they can apply for citizenship". The criteria go on to state that the "person must be well integrated, familiar with customs and traditions, law and abiding and pose no threat to internal or external security." In other words, being born here is only one factor, sticking around for at least 12 meaningful years should be another. We have a friend who said he lost his Australian permanent residency status because he was not in-country for the 5 (?) year mandatory requirement.
The writer ("'Are you 'of this place'?", TODAY, 5 May 2014) was making the point that "we do not need indiscriminate immigration and immigrants who treat Singapore like a hotel and fellow Singaporeans as hotel staff." He gathered the impression from the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) website stipulations, which seem to be weighted heavily on economic contributions and feather light on the qualitative aspects of citizenship e.g. the United States' prerequisite assessment of English proficiency and knowledge of US history and government.
Few can dispute these sentiments:
"We need immigrants who are "of this place" and our selection processes should be long and tough enough to find such people... If we spend twice as much, take thrice as long and finally get half the final numbers because we cannot find enough, so be it."
In other words, don't make up the 6.9 million just because of some policy maker who didn't bother to put his signature on the Population White Paper.