The President of the Republic stated today that he is awaiting his legal team's analysis of the decrees on nationality and reiterated that he wants to see the grounds presented by the Socialist Party for requesting a preventive review of constitutionality.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa was speaking as he left the Euro-Americas Forum at the Carcavelos Campus of the Nova University of Lisbon, in response to questions from the media, who asked him if he had already made his assessment of the decrees on nationality and if he saw any constitutional problems with them.
"First, I haven't finished that [evaluation] yet, because I'm not the one who does it right away, I mean, there's a legal team that does it, in relation to two decrees," the head of state replied.
The President of the Republic stressed that "it is not one, but two" decrees, "and one of them is long," which revises the Nationality Law, while "the other is shorter," which provides for the loss of nationality as an accessory penalty.
"Furthermore, I am unaware of the requests; I think they haven't been submitted yet—they could be submitted by Wednesday or Thursday, I don't know—from the [PS] deputies," he added.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa stated that he is awaiting the "legal analysis" and "access to the reasons invoked by those who requested the declaration of unconstitutionality," declining for now to comment on the content of these two decrees.
The decree amending the Nationality Law and another that provides for the loss of nationality as an accessory penalty, both originating from a bill proposed by the PSD/CDS-PP government, were approved on October 28, with 157 votes in favor from PSD, Chega, IL, CDS-PP and JPP, and 64 votes against from PS, Livre, PCP, BE and PAN, and were sent to the Belém Palace on Tuesday.
The Constitution establishes that legislative initiatives regarding "the acquisition, loss, and reacquisition of Portuguese citizenship" take the form of an organic law.
In the case of organic laws, within eight days of receiving the decrees, in addition to the President of the Republic, the Prime Minister and one-fifth of the deputies -- 46 out of 230 -- may also request a preventive review of any of their provisions, in accordance with the Constitution, a right that the Socialist Party has already announced it will exercise.
The decree revising the Nationality Law, among other changes, increases the timeframes for foreigners legally residing in Portugal to acquire Portuguese nationality and restricts its granting to those born in Portugal, with immediate effect.
The parliamentary decree amending the Penal Code to create the ancillary penalty of loss of nationality may apply to anyone who is a national of another State and is sentenced to an effective prison term of four years or more within ten years of acquiring Portuguese nationality.
These two decrees were approved with the same vote, by more than two-thirds of the deputies, a majority that allows for their eventual confirmation even if they are declared unconstitutional by the Constitutional Court.