PHILLIP Choi and his sister Amy are just like thousands of other Australian youngsters full of hopes and dreams for their future – with one very important difference.

They face being forced out of the place they love and have grown up in, three days before Christmas, to go and live in a country they barely know or understand.

The Gold Coast siblings are pleading for Immigration Minister Peter Dutton to step in and grant permanent residency so they and their parents do not have to leave for South Korea after building a family life here.

“I beg you, please, for one last time, reconsider your decision,’’ Phillip said.

The 20-year-old has spent 13 years of his life in this country, while Amy, 18, was born here.

“It is devastating. We are Australian. This is our home,’’ he said.

Both are OP1 students and Phillip was school captain at Robina State High. They are active in a range of community groups.

His father Leo came to Australia as a student, accompanied by wife Joanne and the baby Phillip, in 1995. Amy was born two years later.

The family returned to South Korea in late 1998 and the children went to primary school.

They came back to Australia on a business visa 10 years ago but an application to renew it was refused in 2010 because a number of businesses where Mr Choi had worked had closed.

When the Migration Review Tribunal upheld the decision in 2012, the family applied to then-minister, Labor’s Chris Bowen, to use his ministerial power to intervene.

In March 2013, his successor Brendan O’Connor notified them that it was under consideration and they were asked to complete health and character checks and an Australian Values Statement.

media_camera Phillip Choi and sister Amy with their friends, Lucille Danks and Tessa Fleming. Phillip was a school captain at Robina High School. Pic: Luke Marsden.

The letter indicated they were being considered for a Former Resident permanent visa.

But more than two years and a change of government later, they received a letter in June saying Assistant Minister for Immigration and Border Control Michaelia Cash had used her public interest power to give them a six-month tourist visa instead.

“We were in shock,’’ Phillip said. “We spent all that time thinking we would hear back any day to get permanent residency and pursue our studies and future.”

Attempts to seek an explanation from the department have so far been unsuccessful.

Migration agents and lawyers they approached said they had never seen a similar case.

MP for McPherson Karen Andrews has continued to make representations on the family’s behalf but her latest letter from Immigration Minister Peter Dutton’s office last Monday said, “the public interest power is now exhausted’’ and if the family does not apply for another visa, they are expected to depart Australia by December 22.

Phillip says a further short-term visa would continue to trap them in a “slow torture’’ of limbo.

Despite their qualifications and offers of university places, he and Amy have been unable to study because as non-residents, they do not qualify for HECS and cannot afford the tens of thousands of dollars in fees.

Phillip and Amy may qualify for student visas but still face the problems of fees and the “devastating” likelihood that the family will be split up.

“Our options are gloomy,’’ he said.

http://www.change.org/p/please-help-our-family-live-an-extraordinary-life-in-australia