The Montenegro State Secretariat has made an official announcement regarding the opening of CIP for new applications
We expect the first applications for Montenegrin citizenship through investments by the end of this year, while the program will be full of momentum in 2020, Dejan Medojević, Secretary of the Secretariat for Development Projects said in the weekly newspaper Weekend.
Responsible, transparent and serious words are what Medojevic describes as a government program that officially began on January 1 this year, through which a maximum of 2,000 investors will be able to acquire the citizenship of Montenegro in the next three years by investing in some of the development projects. According to the program, places in the program will not be for people with dirty money, nor for security interests, which makes the fears of political untruths and part of the public perceived as unjustified.
“The Secretariat started a program of economic citizenship on behalf of the Government. The government has previously made a very precise decision on how economic citizenship can be achieved. It’s not a classic sale of a passport that everyone is talking about, but this is primarily a development project for Montenegro, and we have arguments here, which is also discussed in the content of the decision, “said Medojevic.
It reminds that every applicant who wants to apply for citizenship is obliged to pay a donation of 100,000 euros.
“This money will be directed to less developed local self-government units and will be spent primarily on the construction of infrastructure and facilities that will contribute to reducing the regional differences between the north and the south. In addition, three areas selected at the moment are interesting for applicants: tourism, agriculture and manufacturing. Since the biggest interest in the field of tourism, we have immediately developed the criteria and the Ministry of Sustainable Development and Tourism has sent a public invitation to investors who have ready projects for the construction of a five star hotel in the south and in Podgorica, that is four stars in the north and the center, “he added .
According to him, the day after the entry into force of the program of economic citizenship, a call was called for the selection of agents for mediation and for assessing international comparability.
“A public call for mediation agents ended a few days ago, and three companies have met very rigorous conditions – Apex Capital Partners, Arton group and Henley and Partners Government Services. The interest was very high, we had more than 20 applications. We will prepare contracts for these days and send them to the Government that concludes them with the agents. After that, the Registry will also issue licenses to mediation agents through which future applicants can apply for citizenship. No less important is the work of agents to assess international similarities. At the first call, which we also called on 3 January, we had 1l of interested companies and to our grief none of them met the required conditions, “said Medojevic.
According to him, the shortcomings were formal-legal in nature, and some essentially because the companies did not prove their experience.
“We noticed that most of the agents tried to fulfill the conditions through mediation agreements that we did not recognize because we asked that they be contracts with legal entities applying for such a significant business. That is why we reiterated this call in the shortest possible time and decided to extend it until the end of this month based on previous interest. It is to be expected that at the beginning of April we will get agents for assessing international similarities. This will create the conditions for the program to start at full capacity and, of course, after obtaining these licenses, we will also invite public auditors. These are all evidence that the Government has decided that this program should be carefully managed and fully transparent, “he said.
Answering the question on how the quality of the applicants will be ensured, Medojevic explained that future citizens of the country will pass a detailed check of the first agents for mediation, the agents for assessing international suitability, then the auditors who will check whether the money has been paid for certain purposes it is planned at the end “when we say that they have fulfilled the conditions, the Prime Minister sends a proposal to the Ministry of Interior (MUP) to carry out final checks, in accordance with the Law on Citizenship”.
“So, the last check is done by the MIA in cooperation with the National Security Agency and the international security services, and we expect that one can not happen to acquire Montenegrin citizenship, someone who at this moment would not be welcome in Montenegro and the European Union,” Medojević emphasized.
It was especially noteworthy that those who come with dirty money, as well as security-minded persons, are not welcome.
“We will try to make those who acquire Montenegrin citizenship as real investors who will invest in the development of the state. I expect that the program in terms of receiving applications will start at the end of this year, and that it will experience full momentum in the next year, “concluded Medojević.
The official announcement is here
