A group of residents have made their official pledge to become citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia.
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The pledge is the final step in a "long process" to obtain citizenship.
Sepe Illig has lived in Australia for 19 years and said it took her about two years to go through the application process.
"You get notifications along the way to update you on the progress of the application," she said.
"From my memory, all the paperwork took well over a year.
"After the paperwork was sorted I had some history to learn and a lot of reading to do."
Known to many Stawell residents as a Librarian, Mrs Illig said she really enjoyed learning more about the country.
"I went through a series of testing and then just had to wait for everything to be formal and official," she said.
"I found the whole ceremony quite special."
Hailing from Nauru, Mrs Illig said she came to Australia with her husband Wes after he spent nine years in Nauru.
"We thought it was his turn now to live where he came from," she said.
"We were always going to start off in Stawell being his home town and we've just never left.
"It's been a great place for us to raise our kids and the kids that are now living with us."
Mrs Illig said she with time she expects she will automatically think of herself as an "Aussie".
"It's still all new," she said.
"I've always felt like I was a Nauruean living in Australia.
"Gaining citizenship was always a plan of mine but it was a matter of sitting down and actually going through the process."
Aldrin Calantog has lived in Australia for more than 11 years, moving from the Philippines.
"There was a shortage of tradespeople in Victoria and I was part of the first roll-out of the skilled migration scheme," he said.
"I have stayed at the same employer, CKS Engineering since I moved out here.
"It took me a long time to get me and my small family up to scratch and prepare them for the tests and the process of obtaining citizenship."
Mr Calantog said he always felt part of the community and becoming a citizen just formalised the process.
"I wanted to be an Australian citizen because I live here and love the place," he said.
"Australia is such a lucky country and there are so many wonderful things the country offers for its people.
"I miss home a little bit, and I would like to think it misses me too sometimes."
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