I don’t think people realize the extent to which the billion dollar industry relied on the state to play fair.
Even until the very last moment, almost all the lawyers, agents and consultants were making the claim “apply now before the laws change to preserve your grandfathering into the old laws”.
I don’t think any of the people in the GV industry ever questioned or considered that this change in the law could be a possibility and that it could be retroactive, so people felt pretty safe advertising citizenship because even if the laws change, we can change our advertising when they do without being put in a difficult situation because our old clients are already under the old law.
Even the state itself advertised across multiple channels citizenship as part of the program, as has been documented by several people, because if things change, who cares, we can change our advertising if they do.
Nobody expected this to apply retroactively, it’s an unprecedented situation, and so now the industry must take unprecedented steps. Imagine you are a lawyer, advising your client about Portugal your home country, building a relationship with them over years, guiding them through setting up a business in the country, connecting them with other folks when required, and then this change happens. You would personally feel a bit ashamed, I know I would, I would be ashamed that my client has been put in such a difficult position. I don’t think this is just a “money grab” to pursue legal action I think it’s also a matter of principle.
People like to characterize folks in the industry as these profit seeking homing missiles, I sometimes also make snide comments about it, but ultimately I think people have a good sense of when injustice is being done. And while there is a profit driven motive, I think there is also a sense of injustice, which in my opinion is what is driving this collective response.
For every story you read, or article you hear about someone being put into some awful situation because of these changes, such as having their 19 year old kid being unable to go abroad for their university without jeopardizing their ability to return home, after you moved your family to a country on the basic principle of protection from retroactive action and now it’s all a mess. Or perhaps the family of four who got four different biometric appointment dates and have their cards running on completely different renewal dates across a multi year timeline. Or the investor who traveled halfway across the world for a renewal appointment which could have been done online, only for there to be a system failure and get a rescheduled appointment which conflicts with their life. Or many many far worse and horrible stories than these tame ones which are not public… for every one of these stories you hear, your lawyers have probably heard 10 more, personally, from clients who they care about because that’s who they have a duty to protect.
I think solidarity here is good, whether lawsuits work or they don’t, people don’t exist in a vacuum, and the emotional damage, the stress of this situation will ripple through the industry and in some way the country and make an already stressed out population even more stressed out and anxious.
You know what strikes me as the most egregious of all? It isn’t the retroactive aspect of the law, it isn’t the change in citizenship timelines, it isn’t even the broken administrative system. It’s the purposeful removal of the clause protecting people from delays of the state. That is what really got to me. The removal of AIMA delays from counting towards your time contributing to the country, after you invested money, not in some house but an actual business that employs local workers and provides value to the country, for them to toss away all of that… there’s no reason, why? You could have stopped at retro-activity, why go even further?
You cannot punish people into leaving, most of the people you want to leave have no choice but to stay, and most of the people you want to stay, have every option in the world to leave. So now you’re stuck with stressed out immigrants whose lives have been tossed into turmoil, investors who feel they’ve been cheated, and lawyers who die a little more inside every time they walk into a room with a smiling new client and are forced to make eye contact.
