The Nationalist Party is due to announce its position on the revamped citizenship scheme tomorrow after a meeting of its Parliamentary group, informed sources said.
The meeting will come a day after the government published a legal notice with the latest changes to the scheme - officially known as the Individual Investor Programme.
The Parliamentary Secretary for Justice, Owen Bonnici, said the text of the legal notice was agreed with the European Commission.
The legal notice provides that:
"No certificate of naturalisation under these regulations shall be issued unless the main applicant provides proof that he has been a resident of Malta for at least 12 months preceding the day of the issue of the certificate of naturalisation."
Asked what the proof would consist of, Dr Bonnici said the onus of the proof would rest on the applicant.
He said that the government would be administering the IIP in good faith.
A former legal notice on the scheme has been withdrawn.
The agreement with the European Commission was announced last week, but the PN - which had called for a residence requirement - had stopped short of declaring its position, saying it would await publication of the formal legal notice after noting differences in the interpretation of the residence requirement.
The European Commission had spoken of 'effective residence' while the Prime Minister said that while there was now a one-year residence requirement, that did not mean that applicants had to be here for the full 356 days.
The PN last week had also filed a judicial protest warning applicants that passports issued under the scheme would be withdrawn.
The government has called on the PN to withdraw the warning, now that agreement on the IIP has been reached with the European Commission.
In a statement this afternoon, the PN noted that the changes made in the legal notice today were the third since the citizenship scheme was approved by Parliament.
It recalled that during the parliamentary debate, the government had rejected the proposals made by the Opposition, including the deletion of the secrecy clause, the need for serious investment and the need for a residence requirement. Yet, three months on, the Labour government had had no option but to change the scheme for the third time.