The sea is endless when you are in a rowboat.
Adolfo Bioy Casares
Your citizenship application has been (successfully) submitted, but when you check its status online at publicbg.mjs.bg, it appears to be put on hold. You keep on checking every week, every day and now even every few hours. No luck though, its status never changes (out of frustration, the techies are even trying cleaning their browser’s cache, but still no joy). Or you have submitted your application through an “agent”, who now has now nothing to say any more. You are suddenly in the middle of nowhere – you have no clue what is going on with your application and the desperation starts building up.
Well, you are not alone in this (apparently endless for you) journey of becoming Bulgarian citizen. Starting from the second part of 2018 (in some cases earlier), the Bulgarian authorities have tightened enormously the procedures that concern the applications for Bulgarian citizenship. Primarily, after the scandals of 2018 with the Agency for Bulgarians Abroad (citizenship by origin) and the pressure from the European Commission (citizenship by investment), the Bulgarian officials became extremely suspicious and are now examining each citizenship application under the microscope. In our opinion, the amount of denied applications will skyrocket by the end of 2019. Those put on hold will most likely remain as such for a time period that we don’t even dare to predict.
The solution
Luckily, there is a way out of this situation. There are number of laws and decrees that apply to the process of obtaining Bulgarian citizenship. Our lawyers will act immediately on your behalf and will find out what the reason the denial or delay is.
Once the reason for the delay or rejection of the citizenship application is confirmed, we will prepare a plan about how to address the issues and will initiate all required procedures. If the client (the citizenship applicant) has been a victim of unscrupulous “agent” who has acted in an unacceptable manner and has thereby violated Bulgarian laws or has caused damages to the client, we will advise on the options as to how to legally claim compensation.
Our promise
Once we have investigated the case (the investigation usually takes from 5 to 10 days), we commit to ensure the client that the issuance of his Bulgarian citizenship certificate will be completed within 35 days.
The way forward
If your Bulgarian citizenship application has taken longer than expected to be approved or if it has been denied, for whatever reason, please contact us at once. We will make sure that all your legal rights have been observed and should you have been a victim of an unprofessional treatment, you can expect a generous compensation for the “blue days” during your waiting time so far.