By announcement of the Council of Ministers of April 6, 2023, the Government declared its intention to set a deadline for the validity of the regime that allowed the descendants of Portuguese Sephardic Jews to apply for Portuguese nationality, in the form of Law Proposal No. 72/XV/1ª [1].
This proposal aims to amend the Nationality Law in its Article 6, paragraph 7, transposing into the Law, the wording that was given to Article 24-A, paragraph 3, subparagraph d) of the Nationality Regulation by Decree-Law No. 26/22, of 18/03, an amendment that represented the introduction, via the Regulation, of new legal requirements, aimed at proving an effective and lasting connection [2] to Portugal by requiring supporting documents:
"(i) The ownership, transmitted mortis causa, (emphasis added) of real rights over real estate situated in Portugal, of other personal rights of enjoyment or of shareholdings in commercial or cooperative companies based in Portugal; OR
(ii) Regular trips throughout the applicant's life to Portugal when such facts demonstrate an effective and lasting link to Portugal.
These requirements, which are virtually impossible to meet, especially in the case of (i), and returning to the use of indeterminate concepts - namely that of "effective connection" - which the Law has been trying to concretize in other types of procedures for obtaining nationality, make it impossible for those who are actually descendants of Portuguese Sephardic Jews to obtain nationality.
But the transposition of these requirements into the Nationality Law is even more incipient due to the fact that the proposal also determines the repeal of its article 6, paragraph 7, in its current wording, with effect from 01/01/2024, which leads to the impossibility of submitting applications for the acquisition of nationality by the Sephardic route, after that date.
It will be said that it was perhaps the realization of the problems that the introduction, via Regulation, of legal requirements of this nature may represent, since they impose real limits and are not a mere regulation of provisions contained in the Law, which is behind the intention to transpose these same requirements into the Law, although this is a matter that will only be settled in litigation, since such assessment is totally excluded from the competence of the Registry Office that will analyze the applications.
It thus appears that, despite the new requirements introduced via the Regulation in force since 01/09/2022, which discouraged many of the descendants of Portuguese Sephardic Jews interested in submitting the application, the assessment, necessarily contentious, of the legality of such requirements, may determine that such requisites, if considered illegal by the courts, will fall, necessarily determining the granting of applications for nationality by the Sephardic route submitted since that date, if all the other legal conditions are met.
This same draft law intents to reduce from three to one year the length of the prison sentence that will prevent the granting of nationality in the case of an existing criminal record.
It should be noted that both the transposition of the requirements into the Law and the intention to repeal Article 6, paragraph 7 itself take the form of a Proposal for the time being and, at the date of this article, the final vote on it is not yet scheduled for this legislature [3].
[1] Proposed Law
[2] It is recalled that this amendment to the Regulation followed the Organic Law of 2/2020, of 10/11, which amended the Nationality Law, where it was foreseen that the Government should amend article 24-A of the Regulation to guarantee, at the time of the application, the effective fulfillment of proven objective requirements of connection to Portugal.
[3] Initiative detail
