אזרחות פורטוגלית לנכדי אזרח פורטוגל

לפי תיקון חדש לחוק, נכדים לאזרחי פורטוגל אשר לא בוטלה אזרחותם , יוכלו לקבל אזרחות פורטוגלית.

Portugal grants citizenship to grandchildren of Portuguese citizens

Published on Monday, 22 June 2015 14:30

By Patrícia Jerónimo, University of Minho

On 29 May 2015 the Portuguese parliament adopted an amendment to the Nationality Law, which grants citizenship to persons born abroad, if they are second-degree descendants of Portuguese citizens who have not lost their citizenship. The Portuguese citizenship will be attributed upon registration in the Civil Registry. In order to be registered, persons need to have an effective link to Portugal, which should be demonstrated by having sufficient knowledge of the Portuguese language and by having regular contact with the Portuguese territory.

Under the new wording of Article 1, n. 1, paragraph d), of the Portuguese Nationality Act, persons born abroad with, at least, one Portuguese ascendant in the second degree of the direct line who has not lost this citizenship, are Portuguese by origin, provided that they declare that they want to be Portuguese, that they have effective ties with the national community and, once these requirements are met, that they register their birth in the Portuguese civil registry. A number 3 was added to Article 1 establishing that: the verification of the existence of effective ties to the national community, for purposes of n. 1, paragraph d), requires the acknowledgment by the Government of the relevance of those ties, namely by the sufficient knowledge of the Portuguese language and by the existence of regular contacts with the Portuguese territory, and is conditional on the non existence of any judicial conviction for the practice of a crime punishable under Portuguese law with imprisonment up to a maximum of 3 years or more.

The amendment will be enforced retroactively, meaning that this new provision will also apply to the grandchildren of Portuguese nationals who were born abroad before the entry into force of the new Act. The new registration procedure replaces the current provision of Article 6, no. 4 according to which a person who was born abroad and is a 2nd generation descendant of a citizen who has not lost his or her citizenship can acquire Portuguese citizenship by naturalisation, without a residence requirement (see EUDO CITIZENSHIP mode of acquisition of citizenship, A12). 

The amendment still needs to be signed by the President before entering into law.

See information (in Portuguese) on the website of the Portuguese parliament.

See more information on citizenship law in Portugal on our country profile.