One overarching narrative has emerged in Malta’s battle to preserve its citizenship-by-investment programme: the EU and its institutions are unfairly singling the country out over its golden-passport scheme.
This narrative is two-pronged:
- Other countries are running similar golden passport schemes,
- The EU Commission had initially approved the scheme before u-turning under the influence of the Nationalist Party.
Is this accurate?
The idea that other EU countries run similar golden passport schemes, yet only Malta faces criticism, is longstanding.
It is a narrative used by Malta’s Prime Minister Robert Abela and his predecessor, Prime Minister Joseph Muscat.
The Nationalist Party’s stance is less clear, with the party’s manifesto calling for the scheme to be amended, and not scrapped.
The idea that Malta has been unfairly singled out has been regularly repeated following the court ruling, namely by MEP Alex Agius Saliba in an address to the European Parliament, and MP Alex Muscat in a recording of ‘Il-Kazin’.
“I’m also astonished that Austria—a Member State with a scheme identical to Malta’s—has been left entirely out of the discussion. I am amazed at how Cyprus, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Luxembourg, Portugal and Spain, which all have residence-by-investment schemes, can continue operating similar schemes, yet when it comes to Malta, it’s as if, because there is someone who to fans, all the windows get shut,” Agius Saliba said.
“We will abide by the Court’s decision so that we can keep a scheme that continues to generate wealth, because Malta is in no way inferior to any other Member State,” he added.
Read the original quote in Maltese
“Niskanta wkoll kif l-Awstrija, Stat Membru li għandu skema identika għal dik Maltija, tħalla kompletament barra mid-diskussjoni. Niskanta kif Ċipru, il-Greċja, l-Italja, il-Latvja, il-Lussemburgu, il-Portugall u Spanja li lkoll għandhom skemi ta’ residenza b’investiment jistgħu jmexxu skemi simili, iżda fil-konfront ta’ Malta għax hemm min irewwaħ, jinqalgħu l-irwiefen kollha.
Se nimxu mad-deċiżjoni tal-Qorti sabiex ikollna skema li tkompli tħalli l-ġid, għaliex Malta m’għandha xejn inqas minn Stati Membri oħra.”
It has even extended to operators. Henley & Partners, a leading service provider for passport buyers, claimed that the “ruling, targeting the smallest EU Member State, sets a worrying precedent for the undemocratic extension of EU competences beyond its treaty-based limits.”
“It would be interesting to see what the outcome would have been if the case were against France or Germany,” it added.
Another key claim in the current narrative is that the EU Commission approved the citizenship-by-investment programme after Malta implemented the necessary amendments, only to u-turn later following pressure by the Nationalist Party.
Both Abela and Joseph Muscat have fanned the flames of these claims. Abela has said that the PN staged a “systematic attack” and “then Simon Busuttil, David Casa, Roberta Metsola, who went out to celebrate that same day of the sentence”.
Meanwhile, Muscat told his social audience to “give a round of applause to Roberta Metsola and the PN who have worked against our country since the first minute”.
In the European Parliament, MEP Thomas Bajada described the golden passports scheme as a “programme that the EU Commission had approved, and we amended it where it was needed.”
Read the original quote in Maltese.
“Programm illi ġie approvat mill-Kummissjoni u emendajna fejn kien meħtieġ. U llum qed niddiskutu allegazzjoni dwar nies li jużaw dan il-programm biex jiżgiċċaw sanzjonijiet fuq ir-Russja, li azzjoni dwarhom bdiet tittieħed.”
Neither MEP replied to our request for comment to clarify the claims.
Did the Commission approve the golden passports scheme?
On 29th January 2014, two weeks after a damning resolution by the European Parliament, the EU Commission and the Maltese government reached an agreement over the golden passports scheme, which required that no citizenship or “certificate of naturalisation” would be issued unless:
“The applicant provides proof that he/she has resided in Malta for at least 12 months immediately preceding the day of issuing the certificate of naturalisation.”
The reached agreement was taken as an endorsement.
In 2021, the Passport Papers investigation exposed that officials often waived the requirement for a physical presence.
Applicants submitted receipts for consumables or newspaper subscriptions, and the average time spent in Malta, according to calculations by the Daphne Caruana Galizia Foundation, was 16 days.
The Commission’s use of “effective residence status” in its press release about the agreement suggests that the Commission was not aware of this creative interpretation of residency.
It referenced the investigation in the ECJ case, noting:
“The actual physical presence in Malta is required on two occasions only: to provide biometric data in order to obtain a residence permit and to swear the oath of allegiance”, and that the “legal residence” (rental or property purchase) does not constitute a “genuine link”.
The Commission’s spokesperson did not reply to a request for comment.
Was Malta singled out? Do other EU member states have similar programmes?
In 2019, the EU Commission published a comprehensive report on the risks of investor citizenship, focusing on Bulgaria, Cyprus and Malta, which were running such schemes at the time.
The Commission’s report also noted that some countries run discretionary citizenship pathways, which are “used on a limited basis”.
In 2020, formal notices and comments were sent to Malta, Cyprus and Bulgaria. Cyprus repealed the scheme that year, while Bulgaria halted its programme in 2022.
The Commission referred Malta to the European Court of Justice in 2022, stating that passports are granted “in the absence of a genuine link with the naturalising country, such as long-term residence.”
As of 2024, most countries in the EU had residency visas for investors, known as golden visas, which differ from citizenship by investment, or golden passports, which offer a passport, citizenship and nationality.
Austria says it does not have a citizenship-by-investment scheme.
Austria does offer exemptions for investors, but these are discretionary. While there is no minimum investment amount, applicants must make a substantial, active contribution to the Austrian economy, creating jobs and implementing projects.
Industry sources estimate that it could cost up to €10 million. A Commission fact-finding study found that all applicants for citizenship were required to pass a language and civic knowledge test and prove “uninterrupted registered residence”.
Among residency schemes, only six on the EU’s list focus on passive investment in real estate. Portugal has removed the real estate pathway, and its golden visa concentrates now on job creation or cultural contributions.
In the case of Portugal, a country often cited in defence of the scheme, an applicant for the residency-by-investment can only become a citizen if they’ve been a resident for at least five years (with sufficient proof of residency), and must also provide certification proving fluency in Portuguese. This is the standard process for naturalisation.
Malta, like Portugal, has a residency by investment programme. This was not subject to the court decision.
The Commission has been pressured to do more against citizenship by investment by the majority of the European Parliament, which has repeatedly called on the Commission to ban citizenship by investment and impose stricter regulations on residency by investment.
The claim that the European Commission’s criticism regarding the absence of a genuine link focuses on Malta while ignoring comparable schemes elsewhere is false.
Since 2019, the European Commission has criticised citizenship by investment schemes in Bulgaria, Cyprus and Malta.
By 2022, at the point of the EU court referral, no other EU country was running a similar scheme.
Austria’s investor citizenship pathway is different from a structured scheme, requiring significant investment in the country that extends to job creation.
Residency by investment (so-called golden visas) should not be confused with citizenship by investment (so-called golden passports).They are entirely different schemes that provide entirely different privileges.
The court ruling does not impact Malta’s current residency-by-investment scheme.
The EU Commission and European Parliament have made that distinction, with the latter calling for a ban on golden passports and stricter regulation of golden visas.
The claim that the European Commission had approved the scheme in Malta before u-turning is misleading.
When the European Commission reached an agreement on the scheme in 2014, Malta failed to live up to the agreement. Simply buying or renting property, offering scant evidence of spending, and scarcely setting foot on the island did not amount to a genuine link or proof of residency. Once those facts came to light, the Commission began its legal challenge against Malta.
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