Em declations at the Assembly of the Republic, Paula Santos stated that the foreigners’ law “should not have been promulgated by the President of the Republic”.
“There were changes, indeed, but the initial objectives remain intact. What was done to the amendments was essentially an attempt to cleverly circumvent the declaration of unconstitutionality by the Constitutional Court (TC),” she claimed.
Paula Santos argued that the law promulgated today by the President is “unjust, inhumane”, has a “strong reactionary tendency” and “attacks immigrants”, highlighting that they are “workers seeking the country in search of a better life”, who “work and pay taxes”.
The parliamentary leader of the PCP considered that despite the amendments, family reunification will still face several obstacles because a dense “normative web” has been created, “in the end, probably very few will actually be able” to use this mechanism.
It is also a law that “maintains a discrimination among immigrants, namely those who have qualifications or, for example, ‘golden visas’, who continue to receive different treatment from this group of immigrants,” she criticized.
In a note released today, the President of the Republic, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, justified promulgating the foreigners’ law noting that the decree from the parliament was “reviewed and approved by 70% of the deputies” and considering that it “minimally addresses the essential concerns of unconstitutionality raised by him and confirmed by the Constitutional Court”.
The new version of the legal regime for the entry, stay, exit, and removal of foreigners from national territory was approved in a plenary session on September 30 with votes in favor from PSD, CDS-PP, Chega, IL, and JPP, and against from PS, Livre, PCP, BE, and PAN, following the Constitutional Court’s rejection in August of five provisions of the previous decree.
PS, Livre, PCP, BE, and PAN, and also the sole deputy from JPP had voted against the first version, approved on July 16 with votes in favor from PSD, Chega, and CDS-PP, regarding which IL abstained. The decree was drafted based on a proposal from the PSD/CDS-PP Government and a bill from Chega.
The new regime limits job-seeking visas to “qualified work”, restricts the possibility of family reunification for immigrants with residence permits in Portugal — not including refugees — and changes the conditions for granting residence permits to citizens of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP).
