Canberra British High Commission in Canberra, Australia, will recommend the Foreign Ministry take back visa-free travel to the UK from Vanuatu due to the lack of professionalism of their Citizenship through Investment program and the absence of screening of applicants.
The new rules will no longer permit people to go to Vanuatu into the UK through the visa waiver accord between the two countries. UK High Commission spokesperson said that because of the “Non-professional” behavior of the Citizenship by Investment program, authorities are concerned that those with a criminal record can be admitted to the UK with no visa, which is alarming. “This can be very alarming.”
In the same vein, European authorities have also sent their recommendations to Foreign Ministers to modify the visa-free entry from Vanuatu towards Europe. The Embassy has yet to respond to questions regarding the revoking of the visa-free deal.
Vanuatu is a small, multi-island country, offers citizenship in exchange for donations towards national development projects. Recently, it has launched the option of real estate for those who would like to acquire assets for investment. Revenue from the CBI program accounts for more than 50 percent of the national Government’s revenue for Vanuatu. The “expansion” of this program has been criticized by the head of the opposition, Ralph Regenvanu, and international media, such as ABC Australia and earlier by The Guardian, UK, that uncovered the controversy of international criminals who had received Vanuatu passports.
Another issue with this program was the recent offer of citizenship to stateless people by a controversial person, Thi Tham Gosset, the director of Vanuatu Lifestyle. She claimed that the initiative was a way to assist people facing discrimination in their home countries. The top intelligence agencies immediately flagged the initiative as a threat to the international community and condemned her utter irresponsibility.
It appears that Vanuatu intends to be an autonomous country with no regard for the criminals who cross borders with their citizenship. Recently, Prime Minister Bob Loughman made bold statements of reform, announcing important changes to the management of their CBI program; however, once the country appears to be operating without regard to the international community’s security.
In November of 2021, PM Loughman announced that the Government would soon sign an agreement with an independent company to screen applicants for the Citizenship program. However, there are no real-time actions considered by the Government to date. In a response in writing to the Leader of the Opposition, Prime Minister Loughman has stated that an experienced and international firm was to be hired to support the Government with screening citizenship applications before the close of 2021, says The Daily Post Vanuatu.
“To ensure the complete implementation of the report in 2020, the government will employ an international-experienced firm to help us build an effective, dynamic and flexible structure of this citizenship program,” declared the PM Loughman.
Vanuatu has visa-free access to more than 100 countries across the globe, including the UK and a variety of European countries. Due diligence is often criticized. Claimed that they don’t have any other independent business that can conduct a rigorous vetting process, which various intelligence agencies worldwide have also criticized.
It appears that Vanuatu intends to be an autonomous country without regard to criminals crossing borders using their citizenship. Recently, some bold claims of reform were made by the Premier, Bob Loughman, in the local Vanuatu Daily Post, indicating major changes to the way they manage their CBI program. Still, it appears that they operate in complete disregard for the international community’s security.
