Archived articles surface, refer to “Kenyan-born Obama”
By Linda Bentley | October 21, 2009
A June 2004 article from the archives of the East African Standard referred to then Senator Barack Obama as “Kenyan-born,” while an article published in the Oct. 11, 2009 edition refers to Obama becoming President of the United States “via a sleepy village in Kenya called Nyang’oma K’Ogelo.”
Last week, an archived article from the Sunday, June 27, 2004 edition of the East African Standard headlined: “Kenyan-born Obama all set for US Senate” was unearthed.
The article began, “Kenyan-born US Senate hopeful, Barack Obama, appeared set to take over the Illinois Senate seat after his main rival, Jack Ryan, dropped out of the race on Friday night amid a furor over lurid sex club allegations.”
The uncovering of this archive went viral on the Internet and could be found on blogs from coast to coast.
Another archived article surfaced last week from the Nov. 4, 2008 edition of the Nigerian Observer titled: “US Presidential Polls: Obama, McCain slug it out today.”
The article, by Soloman Osowata with Agency Reports, stated, “The Kenyan-born Senator will, however, face stiff competition from his Republican counterpart, John McCain who has taken the presidential battle to the finishing line with vigorous campaign strategies.”
More recently, the Oct. 11, 2009 edition of the Standard published an article questioning whether or not Obama deserved the Nobel Peace Prize.
The opening sentence in that article stated, “It seems Barack Hussein Obama, President of the United States of America (via a sleepy village in Kenya called Nyang’oma K’Ogelo) can do no wrong.”
In light of these recent discoveries, Snopes.com has been surprisingly silent on the matter, as have other fact-checking websites. Snopes.com has aggressively debunked any and all questions about Obama’s birthplace, even going so far as to change archived information when the very left-leaning couple that runs Snopes.com realized certain posts contradicted other posts on their own website.
The November 2008 edition of the Organization of American Historians (OAH) Newsletter contained an editorial by Monica-Wanambisi Mwesel, a literature professor at the University of Nairobi, titled: “What Kenyans think about an Obama win.”
According to its website, the OAH, founded in 1907 as the Mississippi Valley Historical Association, “is the largest professional organization for the investigation, study and teaching of American History. It serves a membership of 11,000 college and university professors, high school teachers, students, archivists, public historians, and institutional subscribers such as libraries, museums, and history societies, as well as individual and institutional foreign members.”
The article, obviously published before the Nov. 4, 2008 election, stated, “Most Kenyans feel that, should Obama win, their lives will definitely improve … Many assume that by being connected to Kenya, Obama would be empowered to send vast amounts of U.S. aid to their country. Since graft and corruption are common to both the Islamic and the Democratic parties, certainly most of this money would go to the promotion of an Islamic state and then financing the conversion of other African states to Islam. Many assume that Obama will channel resources that will go a long way in improving the lives of the people.”
Mwesel mentions schools were renamed after Obama prior to his most recent visit with the hope of attracting funding, since it would be considered “a shame that a school named for a great American should be so dilapidated.”
She went on to say, “A widespread assumption is that, being a Kenyan, Obama understands the problems Kenyans face. Hence they expect more foreign aid from him. They wonder why they should stay poor while they have a Kenyan president of the U.S.”
Close to half of Kenyans, Mwesel said, dreaded the prospects of an Obama presidency and were fractured along ethnic lines, citing the Kikuyu tribe feared an Obama victory would boost the chances of Raila Odinga, a Luoccai like Obama, to ascend to the presidency.
Mwesel concluded, “It is therefore very clear that Senator Obama draws frenzied support from the Luo ethnic group of his ancestors, while many members of the rival Kikuyu group do not support him.”
In fact, Mwesel said the majority of the Kikuyu favored New York Senator Hillary Clinton during the Democratic primaries.