It is an unusual story that happened to Barbara, a resident of Saint-Nazaire, in Loire-Atlantique in France. While she had started the process to obtain a new identity card following losing hers, the administration of her town hall asked her if she wanted to have “widow or wife” written behind her name. Very surprised by the request, she is content to reply that she is not married.
Problem, three weeks later the town hall reiterates the same request. The secretariat then announces to her that she has been married since February 14, 2009, according to a mention indicated on her birth certificate. Barbara even discovers that the ceremony would have taken place in Guérande a few months before the birth of her son. To correct the error, the town hall asks the mother to certify on her honor in an email that she is not married. A request that Barbara refuses. “It was not me who made a mistake. I immediately asked for a copy of my boy’s act, fortunately no trace of this man on his, ”she justifies herself to our French colleagues from Echo.
To understand what might have happened, the mother of the family decided to find her fake husband on the basis of his name. “I ended up having him on the phone on Saturday November 5th. He didn’t take me too seriously and replied that he had all his papers in order. He finally agreed to call the town hall. Civil status would have told him that this error has no consequences for him, but it must have consequences for his wife, to whom he married on February 14, 2009”, explains Barbara who wonders how such an error might occur. “I do not share his wife’s first or last name. We were just born the same year, a day apart, in the same city,” she continues.
In the meantime, Barbara’s request for an identity card has been suspended and she is waiting to be able to meet the person in charge of the civil status service to correct the error as soon as possible.
