Macau does not accept new residence applications from Portuguese in the Immigration Services based on the “exercise of specialized technical functions”, only admitting justifications of family grouping or previous connection to the territory.
The new guidelines, to which the Lusa agency had access, date from early August and eliminate a practice established shortly after the transition to China from the former territory administered by Portugal, despite the fact that the form provided by the Migration Services It still contemplates the possibility of requesting residency to perform specialized technical functions.
“For now, according to the information we have, any new application for residence submitted by Portuguese citizens through the Migration Services, through the Police Force, is only accepted for reasons of ‘family grouping’ and ‘prior connection with the Macau SAR’.” of Public Security (CPSP), lawyer Pedro Meireles told Lusa.
That is, now, the alternative for a Portuguese to guarantee residency is to apply to the recent programs of the legal regime for attracting qualified professionals framed in law no. 7/2023 “on equal terms with citizens of any other nationality, “the Portuguese nationality of the candidate is not a positive or negative factor in the evaluation of the candidacy,” explained the lawyer from JNV – Lawyers and Notaries.
Another hypothesis is the issuance of a ‘blue card’, an employment contract granted to non-residents, without health or educational benefits and without the possibility of guaranteeing permanent residence in the Special Administrative Region (SAR) of Macau.
“If a Portuguese citizen wants to emigrate to the Macau SAR to work here in ‘specialized technical roles’, if there is no open program in the legal regime to attract qualified professionals to which they can apply and/or it is not a case of family reunification with residents in the Macau SAR, the solution that seems viable to us (…) is for your (future) employer in the Macau SAR to request hiring authorization (quota)” and then, if it is granted, “We request the issuance of the ‘blue card,'” the lawyer explained.
Between April 2003 and November 2021, residency applications from Portuguese nationals were expressly mentioned in the law and were equated to residency applications from Chinese citizens, but this changed with the new legislation.
“Residency applications from (…) Portuguese are no longer expressly mentioned (neither in law no. 16/2021 nor in administrative regulation no. 38/2021), that is, ‘this special mention has disappeared'” said Meireles.
However, in practice, residency applications based on the performance of specialized technical functions continued to be accepted until August.
Lawyer José Abecasis rejected that “the current circumstances justify a radical change in position, which is not transparent and which catches the community – if not the official entities – completely off guard.”
But, in reality, everything changed with the new guidelines, which appeared shortly after the publication of law no. 7/2023, at the end of May.
The authorities will have “modified their procedures upon the entry into force of Law No. 7/2023, however, it should be noted that (…) they did not alter and/or repeal Law No. 16/2021,” Pedro highlighted. Meireles, also arguing that this “should not have affected the current system of granting residence permits through Migration Services.”
José Abecassis reinforced this understanding, maintaining that “the approval of Law No. 7/2023 (…) did not change anything in the procedure or in the requirements”, all the more so since “the portal of the Government of the Macau SAR “continues to inform that applications submitted by citizens of Portuguese nationality must continue to be evaluated in accordance with law no. 16/2021.”
In the case of renewals, it is still considered the basis for “exercising specialized technical functions in the Macau SAR,” Meireles highlighted.
Source: TSF
