CITIZENSHIP BY INVESTMENT SCANDAL; THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK

In response to the actions of the United States and the European Union, which are requiring meaningful changes on the part of the Eastern Caribbean states that offer Citizenship by Investment (CBI/CIP) passport sales programs, we are seeing efforts by the Investment Migration industry to push back against them, by couching the debate as one of local national sovereignty versus overbearing "Superpower Pressure." This is artful propaganda of the first order.

The passport sales industry is claiming that the choice offered to the five EC states is either submitting to the demands of the US and EC, or continuing to sell their lucrative passports. The industry argument is that wealthy CBI purchasers should have to agree to mandatory physical presence, for a definite period of time, in the jurisdiction, and having to be educated in the history, government and culture of their adopted country, nor should they be required to do so, as a permanent condition of acquiring, and retaining, that prized passport. For an industry that focuses upon the professed ability of second passport holders to migrate elsewhere, its hypocrisy is showing.

I take personal offense to this argument, the most prominent proponent of which is the CHRISTIAN NESHEIM, the publisher of the passport industry's most prominent media, IMI DAILY, which is financially supported by companies selling CBI, and has therefore a serious Conflict of Interest in speaking to both the Caribbean CBI states, as well as prospective investors, on all relevant issues. Nesheim's reluctance to support meaningful reform in the CBI industry is noteworthy, as is his continued association with investment migration companies associated with CBI fraud. He is neither an attorney nor an accountant, but appears to offer advice to potential citizenship purchasers that is best received from practising professionals, as the news about the future usefulness of these expensive passports is problematic.

IMI's Christian Nesheim

Appealing to the baser instincts of corrupt Caribbean leaders, who have now become addicted to the lucrative income that CBI brings to their troubled economies, I fear that the necessary comprehensive reforms will not be effectively implemented, that as the direct and proximate result, visa-free EU travel with be terminated, Caribbean nationals will lose all access to the United States, due to reasonable national security concerns, and the programs will lose their attractiveness in the marketplace. Investors will find their second citizenships elsewhere in the world, and lawyers for those who have already bought all those now worthless passports will have a field day suing the companies in the self-described investment migration industry for fraud and deception, and those who assisted them.