I don’t follow American politics with the same passion I follow African politics, so it was hard for me to know what parts of the Democratic National Convention to tune in for. But I knew I should be watching Tuesday night to see Barack Obama speak, for the simple reason that Kenyan blogger friends have been raving about him for months. So I scored lots of political knowledge points by inviting friends over for his speech (and then “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy”) last Tuesday night.
No one was disappointed – after cheering along with the crowds at a vision where blue and red America, not to mention black and white America, live and work together, friends and I started designing our “Obama for President 2012 (oh, and Kerry for president 2004)” t-shirts.
What’s been fun over the last few days is watching the explosion of support and enthusiasm in the African blogosphere for the future Senator from Illinois. Mental Acrobatics, a Kenyan blog, has an analysis of “Obama, the Uber-candidate”:
Kenyan (father): black vote, immigrant vote
Kansas (mother): mid America vote, man of the people vote, blue collar vote, rural vote
Hawaii (where he grew up): west coast vote, pacific island vote, small state vote
Chicago, Illinois (where he is standing): urban vote, black vote again, big state vote…
Ory Okolloh, a Kenyan colleague of mine at HLS, broke the story a few days ago that popular Kenyan beer “Senator” is now being referred to as “Obama”, with people walking into Nairobi bars and ordering a round of Obamas. The New York Observer has an excellent piece today by Andrew Rice, who had the chance to follow Uhuru Kenyatta, son of Kenya’s first President Jomo Kenyatta, to the DNC to watch the Obama speech. Needless to say, the Kenyan delegation is thrilled at the prospect of a native son holding one of the most powerful offices in the US.
The enthusiasm over Obama in Kenya reminds me a bit of the Ghanaian excitement over Freddy Adu. Never mind that soccer is, at best, America’s sixth most popular sport – the idea of a Ghanaian superstar becoming famous enough to appear in Nike ads is hugely exciting. Adu has literally put Ghana on the map for millions of American sports fans. (And, based on my last trip to Accra, he’s put lots of DC United shirts on the back of Ghanaian soccer fans.) For millions of Americans who haven’t thought about East Africa since the embassy bombings in 1998, Obama is likely the first person to make them think about Kenya.
Obama has accomplished an amazing feat already: he’s captured the imagination of two nations. I can’t wait to see what he does as a senator.
Special bonus section – Kenya-focused blogs you should be reading: