The gate of the African school named after Democrat U.S. Presidential Candidate Barack Obama
Barack Obama’s promise to his father’s African village hasn’t been kept. A promise broken in the two years since his historic visit to his father’s ancestral village in 2006 still hasn’t been realized. Another photo-op and more stagecraft with no pledges kept to help fund the school honored with his name.
Barack Obama; proving that he is nothing more than an empty suit filled with empty promises.
Barack Obama’s broken promise to African village
It is an extraordinary sight to walk into a basic two-room house under a mango tree in rural east Africa and discover what is essentially a shrine to Barack Obama.
The small brick house with no running water, a tin roof and roving chickens, goats and cows is owned by Sarah Obama, Barack’s 86-year-old step-grandmother. Inside, the walls are decorated with a 2008 Obama election sticker, an old “Barack Obama for Senate” poster on which he has written “Mama Sarah Habai [how are you?]“, a 2005 calendar that says “The Kenyan Wonder Boy in the US”, and more than a dozen family photos.
But this bucolic scene in his father’s village of Kogelo near the Equator in western Kenya conceals a troubling reality that, until now, has never been spoken about. Barack Obama, the Evening Standard can reveal, after we went to the village earlier this month, has failed to honour the pledges of assistance that he made to a school named in his honour when he visited here amid great fanfare two years ago.
At that historic homecoming in August 2006 Obama was greeted as a hero with thousands lining the dirt streets of Kogelo. He visited the Senator Obama Kogelo Secondary School built on land donated by his paternal grandfather. After addressing the pupils, a third of whom are orphans, and dancing with them as they sang songs in his honour, he was shown a school with four dilapidated classrooms that lacked even basic resources such as water, sanitation and electricity.
He told the assembled press, local politicians (who included current Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga), and students: “Hopefully I can provide some assistance in the future to this school and all that it can be.” He then turned to the school’s principal, Yuanita Obiero, and assured her and her teachers: “I know you are working very hard and struggling to bring up this school, but I have said I will assist the school and I will do so.”
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The market is where we head next to speak to villagers about their hopes for an Obama victory in November and what it might do for their village. Mary Manasse, 40, who runs the Mama Siste Mini Shop selling staples such as bread and cow’s milk (packaged in old Coke bottles) says she has a photograph of Obama shaking hands with her on his 2006 visit.
“Back then I was looking after 40 orphans at the orphan centre,” she recalls. “We faced a desperate shortage of money and Obama told us that he especially liked special, dedicated projects like ours and wanted to help. We thought he would give funds to help our project but we got nothing. A few months later we were forced to shut down the orphan centre because of lack of funds. Just a million Kenyan shillings [£6,000] would have kept us going another year. I feel disappointed that he did not come through.”
A few stalls away mango-seller Gladys Anyango, 60, does an impromptu Obama impression to the amusement of her fellow peddlers. She places her hands on her hips, gazes into the middle distance and, mimicking his deep voice, says: “How are you, people of Kogelo?” Her friends collapse with laughter. She also takes off Obama’s wife, Michelle, who had accompanied him on his visit along with his two daughters, Malia and Sasha.
“Oh, but there will be a big party here when Obama wins,” she adds. “We still have hope that he will bring electricity and build schools so the children have a good education. Maybe when he’s President of America, he’ll remember his roots and look after his community in Kenya.”
The Messiah is too busy saving Europe on his “Most Excellent World Tour”… to hell with the relatives.
t/b: Michelle Malkin
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Oh, don’t be to hard on the young fellow.
After all, he tossed the white side of his family–especially grandma, remember?–a while ago.
Maybe that was to balance his even-longer-ago abandonment of the black side of his family.
The guy’s a uniquely despicable piece of work, isn’t he?
I know that living in a $1.5M house doesn’t leave much for charity, so maybe it is up to us peons to band together to collect some money for the children of these poor people. I hear that a rich, important relative from America promised to help them and never delivered, even though he was a community organizer with lots of connections and went to an Afro-centric church. The villagers Hope he will Change his ways.
I also hear that about 42% of the American population are setting themselves up for a similar disappointment.
Anyone want to help me set up a web site to collect donations for the kids mentioned in this article? I’m serious. I bet we could leverage this to raise significant money for these kids, much like Rush did with that letter from the Dems that he auctioned off. We can buy a url, connect with a charity that will work with this school & village, then broadcast it to the world, possibly explaining that we don’t want folks to think that all Americans skip out on their promises.
If BHO goes to kenya,hell look far more presidential than ever.Can B Hussein win the election in Kenya?I doubt but somehow some liberals think he can win here!An African being elect as prez of the USA!dream on libs.
Empty promises? What does anyone expect from Mr. Obama? He’s full of them, every day another hand-out, that he can’t possibly fund. I’m shocked by this article. What a lousy piece of work he (Obama) is, and this is what America needs? Lord help us all.
Oh, and of course he won’t send money, don’t you know, Liberalism/Socialism elites live at the top, and tell the rest of us how to spend our hard earned dollars. (They confiscate it through force!) This man has never held a job, community activist, living off the money of others, oh he was a lawyer here in Chicago, with shady ties to slum lords (Renzko) and the like, politician in Illinois, now the U.S. Senate. Never had to work for a living, subsidized educations for him and his wife, based on race. No exposure to the realities most people face: Paying for education, working for a profitable business, learning how to make a business profitable, working to improve one’s standing at the “office” or shop, or factory. We all improve our lives through our own hard work, not expecting, nor receiving the benefits he has become accustomed. It’s sad that this is what my country has come to. Is the rabid Bush hate forced us into this position? Socialism is back with Mr. Obama, with a fury of force and hate. Don’t we all realize, that any question of his beliefs or of him are taboo? If we question them, there’s obviously something wrong with us. No critical debate, or vetting of this man has been done by the media, or even his own party. He’s a false god, a fast talking salesman, a snake oil salesman, no substance, just a great gift of selling. Be warned, we’re in big trouble.
This reminds me of the Chicago districts in which he had oversight during his term as State Senator. Promises followed, not by actions and responsibility, but by further decay. Hopefully this is not a preview photo of Main Street America in 2011.
Do you think the righteous Oprah will call her endorsed lying candidate on the carpet as she does with her authors?
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