On October 5, 2022, the Spanish Senate approved the long-awaited Law of Democratic Memory, whose goal is to unveil the truth about the Spanish dictatorship and to make reparations to the victims of abuses and persecutions. This new law will be published in the coming days in the Official State Gazette, and it is expected that a regulation will soon be issued to provide the legal scaffolding for the law to become effective.
For the children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of Spaniards, this law offers unprecedented possibilities to acquire Spanish nationality.
The section of this law which has aroused the greatest interest among Spaniards living abroad is the eighth Additional Provision which includes three new cases of access to Spanish nationality for the descendants of Spaniards born abroad.
This Provision establishes in the first place that “those born outside Spain of a father or mother, grandfather or grandmother, who were originally Spanish, and who, as a consequence of having suffered exile for political, ideological or religious reasons or for reasons of sexual orientation and identity, have lost or renounced Spanish nationality, may opt for Spanish nationality, for the purposes of Article 20 of the Civil Code”.
Secondly, it also establishes that “the sons and daughters born abroad of Spanish women who lost their nationality by marrying foreigners before the entry into force of the 1978 Constitution” may acquire Spanish nationality.
Thirdly, access to citizenship is also facilitated for “the sons and daughters of legal age of those Spaniards whose nationality of origin was recognized by virtue of the right of option in accordance with the provisions of this Law or in the Seventh Additional Provision of Law 52/2007, of December 26 (Law of Democratic Memory)”.
In these three cases, “this declaration must be formalized within two years from the entry into force of this law. At the end of this period, the Council of Ministers may agree to extend it for one year”.
In Corral International we are ready to support the Spanish descendants in the construction of the dossier for the Spanish government, under the assumptions of the new law, and according to the other rules related to nationality.