Thirty years ago, Barack Obama, 27, kicked of a journey of self-discovery to learn more about his heritage and his father, who hailed from the sleepy village of Kogelo.

But when his commercial flight landed at an empty airport, he felt “tired” and “abandoned,” Obama wrote in his memoir, Dreams From My Father.

A gate agent informed him that the airline had misplaced his bags. His half-sister Auma and Aunt Zeituni Onyango picked him up in a rickety, baby-blue Volkswagen Beetle, minus a muffler.

Then Obama returned in 2006 as an Senator for Illinois and a rising star in the Democratic Party.

But Obama was derided by government operatives as “an ill-informed junior senator” for criticising President Mwai Kibaki’s anti-graft record.

Years later in 2015, Obama arrived in Kenya aboard Air Force One, chauffeured around in a heavily armored limousine, as the 44th President of the United States.

In his own words, Obama was “the first Kenyan-American to be President of the United States”.

So, as he makes a third trip to his ancestral home in Siaya county today — as Private Citizen Obama — it’s likely to be an emotional moment for a man who had very little time to interact with his father.

 “My father was a foreign student, born and raised in a small village in Kenya. He grew up herding goats, went to school in a tin-roof shack. His father — my grandfather — was a cook, a domestic servant to the British,” Obama said in one of his most memorable speeches on the campaign trail in 2004.

Though there has been a lot of sprucing-up and public relations, the area remains poor. It is this poverty and lack of opportunity that Obama will be seeking to change when he inaugurates his half-sister Auma Obama’s Sauti Kuu Foundation.

It’s by invitation-only, there will be no rally
The foundation aims to create a place for disadvantaged children and young people where they can discover their strengths and realise their full potential, especially in sports and vocational training. It includes as Sports Centre and a Resource and Vocational Training Centre.

“Given that his own mission under the Obama Foundation is to inspire and empower people to change the world, his attendance at this event at our ancestral home, where our father was laid to rest, is of great significance to me,” Auma said last week.

The ex-President landed at JKIA at about 1pm yesterday, accompanied by his sister Maya Soetoro-Ng and her family and Obama Foundation staff members.

He was met by his sister Auma Obama, Foreign Affairs CS Monica Juma, US Ambassador Robert Godec, Executive Chairperson of the Gina Din Group Gina Din Kariuki, MD Gina Din Group Lorna Irungu-Macharia and General Manager Security Services of Kenya Airports Authority Brig Gen (Rtd) George G. Kabugi

After pleasantries, Obama immediately left for State House for a private meeting with President Uhuru Kenyatta,

While welcoming the former US President to Kenya, President Kenyatta thanked Obama for keeping his promise of visiting the country after his last visit in 2015.

President Kenyatta congratulated Obama for establishing the Obama Foundation, which seeks to empower youth to become the agents of change that the African continent needs.

The two leaders agreed that the youth in Africa could become the continent’s most valuable asset if their energy and creativity are harnessed.

President Kenyatta, who was joined by Deputy President William Ruto and other senior government officials, assured Obama that he can count on the support of all African leaders to scale-up youth programs under his foundation.

President Kenyatta gifted the former US President, who is himself a noted author, with two books on Kenya’s youth and success stories in the last 50 years, namely Aspirations of a Generation - Youth of Kenya and Kenya at 50.

After inaugurating the Sauti Kuu Foundation and visiting his ancestral home in Alego Nyang’oma of Siaya county, Obama heads to South Africa where he will deliver the 16th Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture in Johannesburg.


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