Marital status concerns

[michaelantwi.obeng@gmail.]

My story...

I am from Africa region but I live in Europe with my wife. We had our traditional marriage between just our two families in (2016).

When we were about to relocate to Europe. It took just pictures, the traditional acknowledgements and apartment contract with our names on, showing we've lived together for about four years to establish that we are married. They didn't even took time to check anything or ask anything.

We planned to register it in the Government marriage system anytime we get the chance to travel back home.

Due to this we entered the DV lottery as single applicants because we didn't have a registered marriage certificate from my home country.

We went back home at the beginning of this year on our holidays and took the opportunity to register our marriage. This was before the DV lottery selectees were published.

I have been selected, however, this seems to be a serious issue because here in Europe where we will be having my interview, our marriage Date in their system is the date we had our traditional marriage(2016). But on our registered marriage certificate it has the date we actually registered our marriage in the system back home.(2022)

We honestly had no ill motivate applying as single applicants. We did that because we thought since we had no proper documentation (Registered marriage certificate) after our traditional marriage.

And we were told that the proof we gave the Europeans will not be accepted in DV lottery as proof of marriage.
Even though we are registered as married in the Europeans system.

One of the documents required by the US embassy here if you are going for any form of Visa interview Civil registration and on that document our marriage DATE is (2016) when we had our traditional marriage.

We are confuse as to stop pursuing the American dream or not.

My question are...

Since I entered as single applicant and got selected, now applying with my wife on DS260 but the date on our marriage certificate (Registered Marriage Certificate 2022) is different from the Date in the Europeans system (Civil registration document "2016") which is the Date of the traditional marriage.
I have to go to the interview with this document.

Should we continue? If yes, will my guinea explanation be accepted? Or we should try again next time?

Even that what should we use, our traditional marriage Date (2016) or the registered marriage certificate date(2022)?
Please help as we do not know what to do now or in the near future.

Thank you for your time and advice

 

[Sm1smom]

There’s only one way to find out what the outcome could be, and that is to continue with the processing (I would if I was in this position). Plan on explaining the discrepancy in dates (if it comes up) at the interview like you did here.

You’ll need to put the 2022 date on your DS260 (as your marriage date) as that is the official document testifying to your marriage.You can explain your relationship prior to getting married in 2022 as common law (which is what I think the European country treated and recognized it as), US immigration process does not recognize a common law relationships. So yes, you needed to get married and have a marriage certificate (like you already did) IMO. And it’s a good thing the marriage took place before the DV results were released.

 

[michaelantwi.obeng@gmail.]

Thank you so very much, we really appreciate your prompt response and advice. We are grateful