Because of his elite career in MMA boxing, Guram Kutateladze came to Sweden from Georgia eight years ago. He had to wait a long time for his citizenship.

- It's hard, you think; should I build a career here? Building a family and a life? You do not know if you can stay next week or if you have to go home, he says.

Matters change high

Since July 2018, you can file a delay claim, which means that you request a decision in your case if you have to wait longer than six months.

Matters concerning Swedish citizenship fall into the Migration Court, which often considers that the appellant is right and should receive answers. Then the case goes back to the Migration Board and ends up in a new pile. Both authorities now warn that it may extend waiting times further.

- The effect of this is that if everyone submits a delay claim, the same paper is collected in the same place, only in a new pile on the desk. But the process of getting to the new pile takes a lot of resources from us, and maybe completely unnecessarily, says the lawyer Lars Sjöström from the Administrative Court.

"Taking resources from management"

The Migration Board may also devote more resources to the delay speech, and Head of Communications Fredrik Bengtsson agrees with the criticism.

"It has created a great deal of increased administrative management on our part, and it takes resources that we could have put on management instead," he says.