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The ceremony happened after Elba and his wife visited Sierra Leone (his father\u2019s native country) for the first time.\u00a0Sierra Leone President Julius Maada Bio conferred the passport to Elba and Dhowre at an emotional private ceremony at his colonial-era residence in the capital Freetown.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m humbled and thankful for the opportunity to become a citizen of my father\u2019s country, it\u2019s an honour for our family,\u201d Elba said. \u00a0<\/p>\n
The actor was born in London but his mother is from Ghana and his father from Sierra Leone. \u00a0Speaking in a mixture of standard English and British-accented Krio, Elba said he had wanted to visit the West African country earlier but \u201cit was in turmoil and he was chasing his own dreams.\u201d\u00a0 \u00a0His father and uncle left Sierra Leone for London in the 1960s and 1970s \u201cwith only two bags and prayers,\u201d he said. Elba\u2019s father died in 2013. But his uncle, as well as senior government ministers, attended the ceremony. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
President Bio said he hoped Elba would help Sierra Leone shed its image as a source of blood diamonds and Ebola virus. The diamond-rich former British colony is one of the world\u2019s poorest countries and is still recovering nearly two decades after the end of a civil war which claimed some 120,000 lives.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n