startopkarena

I have just stumbled on this website and must say that it has been really helpful. However, I have got some concerns over the dv lottery programme and will appreciate all the help I can get.

My husband was notified about a month ago about his success at progressing to the next stage of the interview. We are Nigerians but reside in the UK and both hold masters’ qualifications in different fields. However, he came into the UK illegally years ago and has submitted his application to legalize his stay in the UK to the home office abt 3 yrs ago but he is yet to get a decision. So my question is this, does his legal status here in the UK affects his dv success even if he meets all other requirements and have a number of people willing to sponsor in the US? I will really appreciate your advice on this.

Also, I have not been able to get the ropes on the prediction of interviews through case numbers and will appreciate some help here too. The rough idea is this 2010af00015***. Thanks

radion

I may be totally wrong here but I would say they wouldn't look on his application favorably, because I would think they would do a lot of background checks and this would surely show up, casting shadow over sponsorship.

I would also say not hearing nothing in 3 yrs is a long time to wait, why isn't he chasing the home office on this, I would have my doubts TBH.
But I'm sure you will get correct advice from these guys on this

maore

here are the pitfalls or issues you might experience:
1. police clearance from the UK

Your immigration history in the UK is none of the US concerns and they actually do not care what they care about:
- Do you fullfil their requirements
- are you a threat to their national security
- etc...
just go for it it costs 900 $ for each and it is worth going through it

startopkarena

Thank you for your response. we fulfil all the requirements and we dont have any form of criminal record not even a driving fine. we are going ahead and keeping fingers crossed.

startopkarena

We dont intend lying over his status here and the homeoffice can confirm his details and application. Also, we have genuine sponsors in the US who are happy to receive us so i dont think there can be any shadows conerning this.

the homeoffice sometimes take quite long if u came into the country illegallly.

Thanks for your reply

starky

Here is how I would look at this. Your husband arrived illegally into the UK, thats a fact. However it does not sound like he has been arrested or prosecuted for this, so as long as his UK police report is clear then hopefully you should not have a problem. Of course if he had been unofficially present in the US then he would never manage to get a DV visa, that is not the issue here though.
Obvious this is jsut my personal opinion, and you really wont know untill it comes down to interview day. What I can say is that at no part during the process or on any of the paper work do you have to explain if you were an illegal immigrant in any other country. Of course there is nothing stopping the consulate from further investigating your case and finding out about his illegal status in the UK. I have been posting on various DV related forums for about three years now and I have never come across a case of someone being refused a DV visa based on illegal presence in a country alone. That is only really anecdotal evidence so cant be over relied on.
Lets put it this way, you most likely wont have a problem as long as you qualify for the DV visa in every category, which includes no criminal issues in your history from any country you have lived in since 16.

You may have a bigger problem though. As you guys are playing from Nigeria then you should be aware that the demand from that country is nothing short of astounding. The year I applied for the DV, there were more applicants from Nigeria alone then the entire of the EU region (well over the 1.2 million EU applicants). This unfortunately means that many thousands of Nigerians never manage to get a current case number. there is a limit on the amount of visas that can be issued to any one country (7% of the 50k as far as I know) and as soon as that limit approaches then they put extra restrictions on Nigerian case numbers. if you check out:

http://travel.state.gov/visa/frvi/bu...etin_4497.html

you will see for the current year that the AF cut off stands at about 48,000 for the AF region, however case numbers for Nigeria are limited at 14,000. That means that if you are from Nigera and you have a high case number then the odds of your case number becoming current are really not stacked in your favor.

i just thought that I would point out one of the flaws of the lottery, that if you are from a high demand country that you have to battle the odds to get picked out, and then the odds that you get a low case number.

you can figure out your chances by comparing your case number to the cut off numbers for Nigeria for the last few years.