I must admit to feeling goosebumps and perhaps even a threatening tear or two when I learned of Barack Obama's election win this morning. How momentous, how symbolic, how wonderful that he won with such a landslide! It felt like you had to pinch yourself to believe it's true.
The significance of his victory is enormous not least to Kenyans who say,
'One of our own has risen up and won the most powerful seat in the world! We are very proud.'
Kenya celebrates. In Kisumu it's wild. Residents stayed up all night in the Kenyatta City Stadium to watch results coming in on massive screens donated for the occasion. Now Mwai Kibaki has announced tomorrow a public holiday in Kenya. Statesment plan to visit the city and throw a proper party African style with food and drink for everybody, dancing and singing. A celebration will be very welcome after a year which began with the city being hammered hard by post election violence in January.
I gather that Kisumu airport will now be renamed 'Barack Obama International Airport'. It's good that Kenya and the western city of Kisumu are receiving tons of positive worldwide press coverage today. It puts the country back on the map after such a disasterous start to the year where it was all pictures of machetes and rioting.
A lot of respect has been given to John McCain for conceeding his position so nobly - an example that can be held up for African leaders to follow in the future. A proper, democratic election took place. No fighting, no manipulating of results, no bloodshed.
Everyone is bursting with pride and hope. The feeling is that if a half Kenyan man can become President of the United States then the sky is the limit for everyone.
The diary of a British expat living in Kenya. News, views, debate and a healthy dose of trivia.
4 comments:
I agree that McCain's concession speech set a great example...I posted a photo from the election party this morning and wrote a bit about it... hope you enjoy! I'm so excited! :o)
I didn't realise that Kisumu was an international airport to begin with!
I'm glad the Kenyans are proud of thier "son" but I hope they don't get too excited thinking that this somehow heralds something amazing for Kenya. I should think that President Obama will be too busy working on his own country's problems.
I did cry I was so happy, and so relieved Obama won. Perhaps now we can change America's image and turn this country in the right direction.
I agree that the significance of a peaceful election process and end of is a very admirable situation that the entire world, especially Kenya, should take note of. However, I did not have goosebumps but did almost shed a tear.
I think Obama is an incredible man that is extremely polarizing and even highly intelligent. However, I think his "plans" for our country are going to be difficult, if not impossible. The pressure he is going to get from Pelosi and Reid are going to be tremendous and put him on the spot.
We cannot afford any of his action items and his taxation is going to be paramount to the destruction of our still fragile economy. This is not only bad for the U.S. but also very bad for the rest of the world. If his plan goes into affect, it will cost my wife and I approximately $1,300.00 USD per month. That may not sound like much, but it will be devastating to our businesses and I am sure we will have to let people go.
Also, it was not a "landslide" victory. There was only a 2 percent difference in the vote total. The electoral college did not necessarily reflect the true vote. A landslide would be Reagan's victory in 1984...
This makes my impending move to Nairobi even more exciting as I truly fear the situation developing here in the U.S.
I do not want to come across as demeaning Obama as a person. I just feel that his policies are not good for me or my family. Knowing the world opinion of the U.S. and the very segregated news that is available about our doings (even from our own press), I cannot imagine anyone thinking that Obama's policies would be anything less than stellar. That is unfortunate too.
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