It was bound to happen, and it did.

On Wednesday, the European Commission said it will proceed with infringement proceedings against Malta on its golden passport scheme. Malta had been facing such a prospect since October 2020.

In a reasoned opinion it sent to the Maltese government, it explained why Malta is going against European regulations. “Investor citizenship schemes undermine the essence of EU citizenship and have implications for the Union as a whole,” the EU said. “Every person that holds the nationality of an EU member state is at the same time an EU citizen. EU citizenship automatically gives the right to free movement, access to the EU internal market, and the right to vote and be elected in European and local elections.”

The government now has two months in which it can reply. If such a reply is not satisfactory to the Commission, it may take the matter before the European Court of Justice.

Wednesday’s news is yet another blow to Malta’s reputation. We already have to deal with being the first European country on the FATF grey list, not to mention other instances in which we faced international embarrassment for situations involving the country as a whole, and individual politicians.

But it was to be expected that the EU takes this hard line against Malta. We have been playing with fire since the scheme was introduced by Joseph Muscat’s government – and this without there being a hint in its 2013 election manifesto – and, frankly speaking, the EU took quite long to arrive at this stage.

All along these eight years, the EU made it clear that it was not happy with the way Malta was granting Maltese citizenship, which amounts to European citizenship, to people from outside the EU who do not have “any genuine link”. When the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, visited Malta last year, she had said that it was of “utmost importance” that the scheme was stopped.

The situation was exacerbated in recent weeks with Russia’s attack on Ukraine, which led to the European Union to take drastic action in the form of sanctions with which it seeks to make it harder for Russia to proceed with its plans and at the same time defend the interests of Ukraine and, with them, those of the entire EU.

The Maltese government has continuously defended itself saying that a strict due diligence exercise is employed each time an application is received. It then boasts of raking in money with which it carries out projects for the benefit of Maltese society. It then suspended its scheme to Russian and Belarusian nationals after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. In a short reply on Wednesday, the government repeated its position that the grant of citizenship falls within the competence of a member state.

But the fact remains that the golden passports scheme has shamed the country. And the commission now seems more intent in taking matters further, particularly in the current circumstances.

Malta’s reputation has taken another hit.