As proud Maltese citizens we have established a ‘Maltese Pride’ committee to circulate a petition among the Maltese residing in the states of Victoria and New South Wales, Australia, calling upon the Maltese government to review its citizenship-for-sale scheme and reach a consensus.

We are extremely proud of our Maltese citizenship, which we acquired as a birthright. We are dismayed at the government’s action in placing Maltese citizenship for sale on the open market. We strongly object to the government lowering the status of Maltese citizenship.

We have taken note of the concerns of the European Parliament and, in particular, the overwhelming vote in favour of the motion relating to the sale of citizenship of member states.

Remarks made by various MEPs representing a range of member states severely criticising the scheme should be of great concern to Malta and, in particular, the adverse impact these may have on trade and financial services offered to other members of the EU.

We are forwarding the petition to Malta for presentation to the Maltese Parliament and trust that the government will reconsider the matter seriously and not proceed with the scheme.