Cabo Verde: Cabinet amends law on foreigners to apply CPLP mobility agreement

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Cabo Verde: Cabinet amends law on foreigners to apply CPLP mobility agreement

6:45 CAT | 25 Jul 2022

Photo: Lusa

Cabo Verde’s government has approved changes to the law on foreigners, allowing for the rules of the agreement on mobility within the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP), approved a year ago, to be incorporated into national legislation.

“A year after its signature and at a time when eight of the nine member states of the CPLP have already concluded their process of ratification of the agreement, approving the structure and essential principles proposed by Cabo Verde from the outset, the government is taking another decisive step by amending our law on foreigners, with a view to incorporating the mobility agreement into domestic law,” the minister of the interior, Paulo Rocha, announced on Thursday.

At stake is a draft bill that proceeds to the third amendment to the law that defines the legal framework for entry, stay, exit and expulsion of foreigners from the country, as well as their legal status, “in order to incorporate the normative provisions of the agreement on mobility between member states of the CPLP, ratified in August 2021” by Cabo Verde’s parliament, in the generic forms of short-term stays, temporary stays lasting one year and residence.

“Yesterday [Thursday] we had the good news that Portugal has approved, in parliament, its amendment to the law on foreigners, also aiming to incorporate the mobility agreement into its domestic law, with only one condition: reciprocity. Cabo Verde’s government yesterday approved the proposed amendment to our law on foreigners, which now goes to parliament for approval and subsequent promulgation, also ensuring reciprocity as a principle in the context of mobility in the CPLP,” said Paulo Rocha, when presenting at a press conference the proposed legislative amendment approved by the Cabinet.

The changes in Cabo Verde will ensure “reciprocity” with what is approved by each of the remaining member states of the CPLP, with the governor giving the example of Portugal as the country with the most advanced process for the implementation of this agreement, prepared during the Cabo Verdean presidency of the community and ratified by all member states at the last summit of heads of state of the organisation, in July last year in Luanda.

“We hope that on the part of the other countries there will be a gradual but evident simplification of procedures. The law approved yesterday in the Portuguese parliament, from what we know, gives quite positive perspectives of what is the opening of at least one member state, Portugal. We have yet to see how it evolves in relation to the other member states, but for now, in relation to Portugal, it may not be necessary to sign any additional partnership instrument, provided that Cabo Verde also makes this change in its internal law,” he added.
Without going into details, the minister said that the changes now approved by the government are mainly aimed at the “processing” of cases, deadlines and “a better definition of what the categories are,” although the mobility agreement is based on each state moving forward at the speed and level it sees fit, in its application.

“From Cabo Verde’s perspective, the CPLP will gain increasing relevance if it functions as an effective forum for closer relations between individuals, businesses and civil society institutions of the different countries that make up the community, if the restrictions on the flow of entry and stay in the territories of peoples who consider themselves friends and brothers, are progressively simplified and reduced,” he explained.

As well as Cabo Verde and Portugal, the CPLP also includes Brazil, Timor-Leste, Guinea-Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Sao Tome and Principe, Angola and Mozambique.

“Cabo Verde will be able to establish mobility with the different countries of the CPLP in two ways: by signing additional instruments of partnership, i.e. a kind of state-to-state agreement, and also directly, via the reciprocity regime guaranteed by the respective internal laws,” said Paulo Rocha.

Source: Lusa