A former deputy minister has speculated that the controversial elements previously in the government's planned citizenship amendments may have been there partly due to compromises the administration had to reach with the civil service.

Ong Kian Ming, who was a deputy international trade and industry minister, postulated that in exchange for granting mothers the right to pass down citizenship to overseas-born children, the civil service may have asked for automatic citizenship for stateless children to be removed.

"The reason is that...