220: Election Day in Western Kenya

This US election is the biggest story to hit Kenya in decades. I’m in Western Kenya doing Stephen Lewis Foundation work, but everyone else, it seems, has only the US election on the brain. One cameraman said this morning, “All the TV crews are here from Nairobi. What happens if there is a bomb in the capital? No one will be there to report it.” Obamania is how the newspaper headlines called this over the weekend.

For the last several days, you could not find a vacant hotel room in Kisumu (the main town in Western Kenya), for either love or money. As a frequent customer, two weeks ago I had to beg for a room. Eventually I got bumped up to a deluxe-suite as the only option left, albeit at a discounted rate. The breakfast room each morning buzzes with reporters from Canada, China, Japan, Israel, South Africa, Mauritania (!), the USA, and various European countries, as well as nearby Nairobi. I got to talk with quite a few of them. In some parts of the city, one can almost count as many Obama tee-shirts and caps here as on an American college campus.

Beginning a few weeks ago, the Obama extended family started gathering at their ancestral homestead in Kogelo, about 90 minutes from Kisumu. The police are only letting certified media reporters into the area. I heard that relatives erected a wall around the compound creating a kind of garrison village. One local resident characterized it as Barrack’s barracks – all in keeping with the country’s favorite son. As it happens, I visited Kogelo village about a year ago. Even at that time, every other shop and school had been renamed for the American senator. As one would expect, relatives have been saying that they are confident that Barrack Obama will win the US election. But no one wants to take the chance: Local soothsayers are doing a good business, sending spiritual messages to underscore more traditional religious prayers. (Hey – I support whatever will help!)

The main pre-election event, one reporter said, is that most of the family is just hanging around getting drunk. Malik Abong’o Obama, Barrack’s half-brother, has returned from the USA to take charge at the family compound and gives a daily press conference. He made it clear that the media can’t report on the alcohol consumption or else he won’t grant any more interviews. But he did say that the fact that the Kenyan government had moved to grade the dirt road leading to the village was an indication of better things to come.

On Saturday, the family held an Obama Cup – a series of soccer matches for TV and local sponsorships. Apparently, they had the family widows playing against the cousins; the grandmother’s side of the family against the grandfather’s, and so on. One reporter said, “The people love it but the soccer has been truly awful. The ball was always in the air, going in all directions.” No matter: After the games, one local newspaper reported that the family enjoyed a “bull roast.” By contrast to the rest of the family, however, the grandmother and great grandmother have gone into retreat – apparently exhausted by all the fuss and they don’t want to talk with anyone.

Also over the weekend, eleven huge billboards with Obama’s portrait and campaign slogan suddenly appeared all over the town of Kisumu. Nobody is saying who paid for them but many local people suspect Raila Odinga, Kenya’s Prime Minister from the opposition party. Odinga claims to be Obama’s cousin – though I couldn’t find out what the connection really is. “It’s like all Kenyans are Obama’s cousin,” said one reporter. This is not all innocent fun, however: Rumors are also circulating that, to further his own political goals, Prime Minister Odinga has said that with his being an ethnic Luo and Obama being ethnic Luo, he’ll now have an “in” to the White House over his political rival, President Kibaki.

What about the story that one of Barrack Obama’s aunts – his father’s half-sister – has been living illegally in the US for years? “A conspiracy dug up by Obama’s detractors,” one person said. “No comment,” said another. What’s interesting is that, seemingly, no one is saying that Barrack should interfere on his aunt’s behalf, although that would likely be the Kenyan way of doing things – one relative helping another. Instinctively, they realize that such an approach runs counter to the way a real democracy works, and that is not the American way.