Mamma Sarah has high hopes for Barack

AS PRESIDENTS’ grandmothers go, she would certainly have some unique and sound words of advice for White House staff.

Sarah Obama sat pensively beside her radio yesterday while across the globe millions of Americans were deciding whether to back her grandson, US presidential hopeful Barack Obama.

Speaking to visitors in her native Luo tongue in her tin-roof home in west Kenya, the 85-year-old, who does not speak English, smiled occasionally as her grandson’s name came over the airwaves.

Outside, a pack of international snap-happy press photographers stood against their SUVs. But this was not Capital Hill.

The midday heat was rising while chickens marched past the porch, under the shade of pear trees.

Barack Obama was born in 1961, the son of a Kenyan father and American mother who had met while at university in Hawaii. They divorced when Barack was two years old and Barack Obama Snr returned to Kenya as a civil servant.

He died in a car crash in 1982 and is buried at the Obama ancestral home in Kogello, outside Kisumu town in west Kenya.

Barack Obama has returned to Kenya several times, most recently in late 2006.

Mamma Sarah, as locals fondly refer to her, waited anxiously yesterday as US voters decided on her grandson, the Democratic Illinois senator.

“I’m upbeat and looking forward to Barack winning the primaries. I’m waiting to hear the results but everything else I leave to God,” she confidently explained through her son and Barack Obama’s uncle, Said.

Barack phoned his family last month when post election violence erupted in the east African country.

His grandmother was luckily unharmed. If her grandson eventually secures enough nominations for the White House, Mamma Sarah has no doubt of his priorities.

“If he’s elected, he will work hard to promote peace and economic development,” she said.

Like her, other Kenyans yesterday held out hope for Barack’s political fortunes. But for other reasons.

Down the dusty road from the Obama home lies a small medical clinic, a local dispensary for medicines.

AIDS and malaria make the region one of Kenya’s most troubled.

“We want him to be a winner. Maybe he can help us in developing our country,” said clinic nurse Mary Ogola.

Local pupils at the Senator Obama Kogello secondary school were also hopeful.

“He’s been performing well. He may become the first black president in America,” said 15-year-old Isaac Oduor.

Back at Mamma Sarah’s home, framed photographs of Senator Obama’s family and visits to Kenya adorn the walls.

Cameras continue to roll outside the door. The US nomination results are just hours away. But does the Octogenarian Kenyan have any plans herself to move across the Atlantic? “America is too cold. I’d just go if he was inaugurated or visit for a short time.”