Applying for Portuguese citizenship? New tests are coming

Happy Halloween. Portugal has signed off the rules that put its tougher citizenship law into practice. It’s Saturday, 31 October. Twenty-three degrees. Air quality: 33 to 58 (Good to Moderate). Here’s what you need to know.

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PORTUGAL SIGNS OFF THE RULES FOR ITS TOUGHER CITIZENSHIP LAW

On Thursday, the Council of Ministers approved the decree-law that turns Portugal’s revised nationality law into working rules. The law itself has applied since 19 May, but the government missed the law’s 90-day deadline to write the regulations in August, so applicants have had the longer waiting times without knowing exactly how they’d be assessed.

Applicants will face tests on Portuguese history, institutions, culture and language, will need to prove they have enough to live on, and must sign a declaration accepting the principles of the democratic rule of law. The decree also covers collecting biometric data. The minister of the presidency, António Leitão Amaro, said citizenship now demands a real connection to the country, but that the government had also cut some red tape. Public services will share more documents, which could spare applicants from fetching papers the state already holds.

The details that matter most aren’t public yet. The income thresholds and the format of the tests haven’t been disclosed, and the decree still needs the president’s signature and publication in the Diário da República, the official gazette, before it takes effect. There’s no promised processing time either.

The waiting times themselves aren’t changing. Since 19 May, applicants have needed seven years of legal residence if they’re from the EU or any Portuguese-speaking country, including Brazil, and ten years otherwise, up from five for everyone. The clock runs from the date of your first residence permit. Applications already submitted before 19 May are being assessed under the old five-year rule. A child born in Portugal to foreign parents is Portuguese at birth only if one parent has lived in Portugal legally for at least five years.

On the same day, the government appointed César Teixeira, a member of the agency’s board, as the new president of AIMA, the Agency for Integration, Migration and Asylum, replacing Pedro Portugal Gaspar. The agency has just turned three. It has grown from 714 staff in 2023 to 840, while Portugal’s foreign population has risen from about one million to almost 1.6 million, according to the migration technicians’ union, which says a new boss alone won’t fix its problems. On 18 September, 89,000 court cases involving AIMA were still awaiting a decision, down from 125,000 in April. Next year’s draft budget would raise its funding to €135 million, from €97.4 million this year.

Bottom line: Tougher citizenship rules are about to become concrete, but the details that will decide individual applications, from the test to the income threshold, won’t be known until the decree is published.

⚡ QUICK HITS

Housing protesters march from Marquês de Pombal to Rossio today. They’ve said they mean to put tents up again tonight in Lisbon and Porto, though they’ll vote on it first. On Friday, the interior minister, Luís Neves, told parliament he takes political responsibility for last weekend’s clearances, while insisting the PSP, the Public Security Police, decides how its operations are carried out. He also appealed for calm ahead of today’s march. The prime minister, Luís Montenegro, says he “can’t build houses with a snap of my fingers”, pointing to 32,000 homes delivered and a €10 billion plan, funded by the state budget, EU recovery money and European Investment Bank loans, to build 133,000 homes with local councils. And a petition for rent caps and compulsory letting of empty homes, with more than 10,000 signatures, is due to go to parliament next week, enough to force a debate.

The government has cut income tax rates for the first six bands, backdated to January. The decree-law, approved on Thursday, sets the rates at 12.2%, 15.2%, 20.7%, 23.6%, 30.6% and 34.6%. The government says it will benefit around three million families and return €400 million to taxpayers, and it’s the sixth income tax cut since April 2024. Most workers and pensioners will notice it in November, when the tax withheld from most salaries and pensions is cut by half.

Portugal has released all the emergency oil reserves it pledged in March, and won’t release any more. The environment and energy ministry clarified this on Friday, after reports that Portugal was among 12 EU countries due to put 42.6 million barrels on the market by the end of January, almost half of it diesel. The ministry says that meeting was aimed at countries that haven’t yet delivered. Portugal’s oil industry association says it sees no imminent risk to fuel supplies this winter, though prices remain uncertain. Diesel has topped €2.30 a litre in many EU countries since the war in Iran began.

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🍽️ SPOT OF THE DAY

ANTÙ ALFAMA (ALFAMA)

Antù Alfama sits in a small alley beside the Igreja de São Miguel, the church of St Michael, in a building with a long food history. It was once Cota de Armas, the upmarket restaurant of the cook Filipa Vacondeus, and later Santo António de Alfama. Since 2022 it’s been an all-day brunch spot, with a terrace in the alley, a bar mixing its own cocktails as well as the classics, and art on every floor, including a tile panel the artist Maria Guimarães designed for the space.

Alongside the brunch menu there are sharing plates, bowls and Portuguese mains, and the space has also hosted rotating art exhibitions and a vintage clothing corner. It suits a slow Saturday in Alfama, before or after a walk up to the castle.

It’s well rated, at 4.6 on Google and 9.1 on TheFork, though TripAdvisor reviewers are less enthusiastic, and in the heart of Alfama the crowd has tended to lean towards visitors. Check current opening hours before you go.

→ Find them here ←

Insider tip: the terrace tables in the alley go first, so arrive before the lunchtime rush if you want one.

📅 WHAT’S ON

See you tomorrow morning.

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