Portugal’s immigrant population revised upward
Blaming the previous governments led by António Costa for what he called an "open-door" policy, Minister Leitão Amaro said that "the era of leniency in immigration in Portugal is over."
Portugal’s immigrant population has officially reached 1,546,521 immigrants at the end of 2024, according to a new interim report from the Agency for Integration, Migration and Asylum (AIMA).
This figure reflects a significant upward revision of approximately 248.857 individuals.
This report says that the number of immigrants in Portugal should surpass 1.6 million individuals shortly, as pending residence regularization requests are finalized.
The figures do not necessarily mean that these citizens entered the country last year.
The calculation is based on the issuing of residence permits and includes part of the more than 400,000 cases that the current government inherited from the previous legislature.
Many of these workers had been in the country for two or three years waiting for the document.
The report shows the evolution in the number of immigrants in Portugal since 2017. It was in this year that the legislative changes that enabled the expression of interest mechanism began.
Fourfold increase
Compared to seven years ago, the number of immigrants has increased nearly fourfold, signaling a substantial demographic shift.
AIMA noted that these additional immigrants had already been residing in Portugal before the government’s abolition of the “expression of interest” system for regularization on June 3, 2024.
Since then, new residence requests have fallen by 59%, from nearly 157,000 in the first half of 2024 to just under 65,000 in the second half.
Government’s reaction
In response to the updated data, Minister of the Presidency António Leitão Amaro criticized the previous Socialist government for what he described as an “out of control” immigration policy.
He stated that the demographic shift represented the largest in modern Portuguese history and blamed the former administration for the “irresponsibility” and “inhumanity” of their approach to immigration management.
According to Leitão Amaro, immigration under the former government was “chaotic,” and the current administration has now brought the situation under control, pointing to the significant drop in new immigration applications as evidence of the government's efforts.
The new data shows that immigrants now represent 15% of Portugal’s population, up from 4% seven years ago, highlighting the rapid changes in the country’s demographic landscape.
“It was a very fast change and the biggest demographic shift we have seen in our lifetime,” Leitão Amaro remarked, arguing that the Socialist government’s policy had created a crisis in public services that could not keep up with the demand.
The Minister further emphasized that while immigration has brought greater diversity to Portuguese society, with people of different cultures, languages, and religions, the rapid growth has also led to potential sources of unrest within communities.
He reiterated that the current government is committed to regulating immigration with a focus on “humanity” and “workforce integration,” prioritizing individuals coming with job contracts.
Immigrants protest
However, the government’s handling of immigration policy has not been without criticism.
On Monday, hundreds of immigrants, primarily from the Indian subcontinent, gathered in front of the AIMA headquarters, protesting the backlog of pending applications.
Leitão Amaro acknowledged that many immigrants had been poorly treated under the previous administration, citing the breakdown of immigration services that left nearly a million people waiting for responses.