No clarity yet on publication of IIP citizens’ list

A year since the introduction of Malta’s ‘golden passport’ scheme – the Individual Investor Programme – the government has not yet published the full list of new citizens in the government gazette as it is bound by law.

In parliament, home affairs minister Carmelo Abela told Nationalist MP Jason Azzoprdi that he was mindful of government’s obligation at law but that he could not specify the time when they will be published.

Abela yesterday also demanded more time to be able to tell the Opposition how much money had been deposited in the IIP account, a posterity fund set up for the purpose of the citizenship scheme.

The first list of naturalised citizens, which will include holders of the IIP passport can be expected in 2015, since the IIP started in 2014 and applicants are granted citizenship after 12 months of residency.

The list will not make any distinction between naturalised citizens, and those who have paid for their passport.

In fact the amended Maltese Citizenship Act no longer binds the home affairs minister to publish the names of all naturalised citizens every three months in the Government Gazette. That important clause, which guaranteed some form of transparency on citizenship, was plainly expunged by a new clause setting up the regulator of the IIP.

Instead a legal notice setting down the rules for the IIP says the minister has to publish an annual list of all those granted Maltese citizenship by registration or naturalization, including those persons who were granted Maltese citizenship under the programme.

Anonymity for IIP applicants was an important condition laid down by citizenship concessionaires Henley & Partners, something that was vigorously opposed by the Opposition.

In November 2013 deputy prime minister Louis Grech told MaltaToday that IIP passport holders would no longer be secret.

But while that statement was believed to mean that IIP citizens would be published in the regular quarterly lists, when the government moved its amendments to citizenship laws, it totally removed the clause that mandated the publication of naturalised citizens; replacing it with the clause appointing a regulator, who compiles an annual report on the IIP without including any personal data of applicants.

Fishing out the new citizens of Malta in this year’s list will be quite a chore: the IIP regulator’s report so far has revealed enormous interest from Russian citizens – over half of the 576 applications.