Nigerians can obtain Argentine citizenship with $500,000 investment in key sectors

Countries where Nigerians can still secure citizenship by birth for their children

… investors will receive settlement rights and visa-free travel to 172 countries

…adjudged to become the second-most valuable citizenship program on the market.

Nigerians can obtain Argentine citizenship with an investment of $500,000 that will be channeled in key sectors, likely to be agribusiness, energy, technology, and tourism.

Obtaining the citizenship will provide settlement rights for investors from any nationality, who will obtain visa-free travel to 172 destinations including Schengen countries; more than any Caribbean citizenship-by-investment (CBI) country.

The Argentine government introduced this with the goal of promoting economic development and job creation focusing on long-term contributions to the country’s economy, rather than relying solely on passive investments like real estate or donations.

It is part of Javier Milei’s, Argentina’s president’s wider economic reform efforts aimed at attracting high-net-worth individuals.

This is the first time that citizenship in Argentina will be directly linked to foreign investment.

As reported by Investment Migration Insider (IMI),

“No South American country has had a citizenship by investment program since Peru’s short-lived $25,000 CIP in the early 1990s”.

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“A CIP programme, would be a huge achievement for the market….the country could likely raise more than $2 billion a year through a donation-based CIP”.

“It would instantly become the second-most valuable citizenship on the market, creating a tier of its own. This is because Argentine citizenship is less valuable than Malta’s, which provides settlement rights in 30 European countries, but more valuable than that of Turkey (which doesn’t have Schengen-travel) and Caribbean (which has Schengen travel but limited settlement rights)”.

According to government sources, the ministry of economy will establish a special agency to assess and certify eligible investments. This new body will work closely with the ministry of the interior, the foreign ministry, and the national directorate of migration to make the application process as smooth as possible.

The programme is said to take inspiration from the United States’ SelectUSA model.

The citizenship-by-investment scheme is part of a broader immigration reform package expected to be released later this week as an emergency decree. The proposal is currently under review by the legal and technical secretariat, and the government plans to issue the changes in two separate decrees to prevent legal challenges.

Industry insiders have noted that discussions are already taking place between a well-known citizenship-by-investment firm and a consortium of major industry players.

With no similar programme in South America since Peru’s short-lived initiative in the early 1990s, this new policy could attract around 2,000 applications per year and generate an estimated US$2.5 billion in revenue.

More details regarding due diligence, timelines, and naturalisation procedures are expected to be provided in the coming weeks after the programme is formally enacted.

Ngozi Ekugo

Ngozi Ekugo is a Senior Correspondent at BusinessDay. She holds a Masters in management from the University of Lagos, an undergraduate from University of Lagos, and is in an alumni of Queen's College. Shes currently an associate member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel Management (CIPM). She has a brief experience at Goldman sachs, London in its Human Capital Management division. She is interested in human capital development and is leveraging her varied experience across sectors to report labour and global mobility trends for stakeholders to make informed decisions.