Most of yesterday’s post was based on public declarations of what the new measures for the 14th July would be as well as on the preliminary reactions by the Commission. The Legal Notice “Travel Ban (Extension to all Countries) (Amendment Number 4)” was published yesterday. As expected, the L.N. “fixes” the terms that had been declared in order to avoid the discriminatory practices mentioned by the Commission. Travel to Malta is extended beyond the possession of a vaccination certificate for certain cases (medical reasons, children aged 5 to 11) while Maltese residents who were expected to return to Malta could do so based on a PCR test.
It is comforting that the L.N. took into consideration these aspects though it is clear that not all persons hoping to travel to Malta will be covered by these changes. One example would be the diaspora of Maltese working abroad who had been hoping to join their family for summer but who have not yet made it for the vaccination.
One particular obstacle to travel for such workers was the extra condition being imposed on holders of vaccination certificates. In fact, according to the guidelines for entry, it was not sufficient to be in possession of a vaccination certificate but there was an additional requirement that the certificate would have to have been issued “at least fourteen days from the administration of the vaccine”. This means that if you obtained the vaccination certificate less than 14 days before your travel date then it was useless and you could not travel to Malta.
Now countries like Luxembourg issue a fully operational EU COVID19 Vaccination Certificate on the day you receive the final dose. As an example I could cite my own family where my wife was due a second dose on the 26th and we are meant to travel on the 31st. IN our case we are lucky we could count on the Luxembourg system and managed to move the date of the second dose to an earlier date to be safe for travel by fulfilling the 14-day condition.
The problem I have though is that the 14-day condition does not result from any part of the legislation in question. The Legal Notice limits itself to the phrase: “persons may travel from Malta to the countries listed in this proviso and from the countries listed in this proviso to Malta as long as, upon their arrival in Malta, they are in possession of a vaccination certificate“. No 14 day moratorium.
As you can see in the screenshot from the Malta International Airport website the 14-day condition has been maintained without any legal basis:
This lack of clarity is not helpful especially since this type of problems normally are “discovered” at the point of entry when faced with an employee sticking religiously to the rules and there is no time for an “appeal” to the law. I might stand to be corrected and would be happy for any enlightenment on the matter but in my mind the 14-day rule has no legal basis and might be unjustly depriving travellers to Malta of their right to move.
