The first position to be opened by AIMA within the task force to resolve the more than 400,000 pending residency applications, the Hindu Center points to progress, but there are many obstacles to be overcome.
The opening of the Hindu Center in Lisbon as a service point for immigrants with pending cases with the Agency for Integration, Migration and Asylum (AIMA) completes three months this Monday (December 9). Since then, according to a survey conducted by institutions that provide services to the agency, around 100 thousand people have been served at this center alone, almost a quarter of the more than 400 thousand pending cases of requests for residence permits in Portugal. Experts believe that the effort that has been made by the government with this center and the others spread throughout the country is commendable. However, there is still much to be done, since the services provided at these locations are limited.
According to lawyer Alfredo Roque, from VE Consultoria, unfortunately, the professionals who work at the Hindu Center do not have the necessary training to carry out the work, which is complex. “They only receive the documents and perform the biometrics, but the actual verification of the documents is done later by AIMA employees. Ideally, the entire process would be analyzed there at the center, so that immigrants could be informed if there were any problems. There would certainly be much less pending issues,” he says. “The centers cannot be staffed only by people who stamp documents,” he adds.
He believes that it would be more beneficial for immigrants and the government to eliminate stages in the service, since there are people who have been waiting for solutions to their cases for more than two years. “The task force centers are excellent initiatives, but their results are lacking. And, once again, it is the immigrants who suffer because their cases are not resolved promptly,” he emphasizes. In total, highlights the Minister of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers, António Leitão Amaro , in the more than 20 AIMA centers spread throughout the country, 221 thousand immigrants were assisted, of which 108 thousand had their residency applications denied, mainly due to failure to pay the required fees. However, appeals are still possible .
According to lawyer Catarina Zuccaro, the weakness of the government's service system is reflected in the delay in issuing residence cards after the residency permits have been approved. According to the current rules, AIMA has up to 90 business days to forward the long-awaited documents. “The problem, however, is that almost no one has received the cards. Only those who have appealed to the courts are being issued documents,” she points out. She also emphasizes that if the previous government had maintained the Immigration and Borders Service (SEF), the situation would certainly be much better for immigrants today.
Structural problems
Lawyer Larissa Belo points out that, despite having entered all documents into the SEF system, which was succeeded by AIMA, during the requests for expression of interest, immigrants notified by the task force centers are being forced to redo everything. “In my opinion, one of the reasons for this would be the loss of information during the transition from the SEF system to AIMA. This would justify the rework, which delays the entire process,” she says. “There is also the limitation of the people who are working in the centers. They do not have decision-making power,” she adds.
Larissa draws attention to the structural problems at the Hindu Center. “There are 20 people providing assistance there, but only one scanner to copy immigrants’ documents. As a result, what we see is a line of people waiting for the center’s employees to scan what they need. As a result, an appointment that could only last 15 minutes, as happened to me, takes up to two hours. This greatly limits the work,” she reports. “However, despite all the obstacles, it is important to recognize that the centers have provided comfort to immigrants who have been waiting for assistance for years,” she points out.
Lawyer Fábio Knauer, president of the Aliança Portuguesa Consulting Company, believes that, within the government’s proposals, the Hindu Center has fulfilled its role in these three months. “However, it is not enough, because, following all the work, we see that there are many uncertainties, especially regarding scheduling, an issue that continues to be subject to legal action. In other words, to reach AIMA, it is necessary to file a lawsuit. This is the biggest sign that the failures remain, regardless of the centers,” he says.
Knauer points out that the government's deadline to resolve all of AIMA's pending issues is June 2025. “The demands for results will increase from now on. Will this deadline really be met?” he asks. “We cannot deny that there has been progress in the last three months, but the situation is far from ideal, so much so that the Courts are overloaded with thousands of cases. We know that requests for scheduling with AIMA should not dominate the Justice system, as is happening,” he states.