'Review of investor nationality programme aims to ease process'

AMMAN — A government committee has embarked on reviewing a decision to grant Jordanian nationality to investors with an aim to provide more facilities under the programme, Minister of State for Investment Affairs Muhannad Shehadeh said on Wednesday.

Shehadeh told The Jordan Times on Thursday that the review aims to ultimately attract more investors to the Kingdom in light of the strong regional competitiveness of some of Jordan’s sectors.

The committee will send its recommendations to the Prime Ministry in the next few weeks for discussion and endorsement, Shehadeh said.

According to the minister, 21 investors have obtained Jordanian nationality under the incentives programme, which was introduced by the government in 2018.

“We currently have a list of 50 applications which are ready to be reviewed,” the minister, who is also chairman of the Jordan Investment Commission, noted on Sunday.

According to Shehadeh, the process is currently being reviewed for further improvement.

Through a Cabinet decision taken in February 2018, investors were offered several options to become eligible for citizenship.

Investors can make a zero-interest, five-year $1.5 million deposit at the Central Bank of Jordan (CBJ), or buy Treasury bonds of the same value at an interest rate to be decided by the CBJ for no less than 10 years.

A third option is to buy securities worth $1.5 million from an active investment portfolio or to invest $1 million in SMEs for at least five years to become a Jordanian national.

Investors can also make a $2-million investment in any location in the country, or a $1.5-million investment if the project is registered in a governorate other than Amman, provided that the project creates at least 20 jobs and remains operational for at least three years.

To obtain permanent residency, any non-Jordanian can buy property worth at least JD200,000 without selling or disposing of it in any manner for at least a 10-year period, provided that the Department of Land and Survey confirms the property’s value.

An investor who obtains any of the mentioned statuses will have the right to obtain a similar status for their spouse, unmarried, widowed or divorced daughters, sons below 18 years of age and for their parents, if they are their sole supporters.