PRESIDENT OBAMA AND AFRICA, A LEGACY OF NO LOVE LOST?

Icheoku says in less than twelve months, President Barack Hussein Obama would finish his two term, eight years, as American president. The first ever elected America's president of African origin, whose father was from Kenya, literally making him an African-African American president as a matter of factly speaking, is on the verge of completing his presidency. President Barack Obama's eightieth year in office as the president of the most powerful, last remaining super power and richest country on earth is nearly coming to the end. But what has the African continent got to show for this very rare opportunity and privilege of a lifetime, if not forever, of having had an American president who is one of their own, this past eight long years in the White House?   Icheoku does not know about the other Joeys and Jackies next door in Africa or at AU, but the verdict is nothing, zilch, nada and at best very insignificant and minimal.  

The continent of Africa did not see any special benefit accruing to it by reason of their son being president of America and you ask yourself why? Icheoku says it would appear that Africans did not show much love to a young Barack growing up and now the grown Barack who is president does not have a reason to return a love which never existed; a somewhat a tic for tat situation where there was no love lost between Africa and President Obama. So query, if Africa did not benefit from America largess or know-how now that one of their own is in charge, when? If Africa did not benefit from America now that a son, sired by one of them, is the president of America, is it when Donald Trump or another Ronald Reagan moves into the White House that Africa would be remembered? If Africa's debts were not totally canceled now that their son is the White House to help spur economic development in the continent, when? If all the conflicts in Africa are not resolved now with Obama in charge, when? In short what type of legacy would a President Barack Obama leave concerning Africa, the birthplace of the man who gave him life?

Watching the last State of the Union address, it finally dawned on Icheoku that President Barack Obama has literally told Africans that they are on their own; and the earlier they take their destiny in their hands the better for them. According to him, America cannot be a nation builder to every country; but no country in Africa had its nation built by America under Obama. Not even a general mention of the Boko Haram scourge afflicting Nigeria was in the State of the Union address; but he mentioned ISIS, Al Querida as well as other terrorists cells throughout the world, conveniently forgetting that over sixteen thousand Nigerians have been brutally murdered by the Islamist terrorists Boko Haram. But for the few armored trucks America donated to Nigeria a few days ago, what other significant help did the son of Africa give to an African country in need? Remember that his government also refused to sell weapons to then President Jonathan's government that was fighting Boko Haram? Meanwhile countries like Israel, Iraq, Jordan, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia as well as countries of the European Union get all manner of assistance they need from America under Obama, while the African son president usually looked the other way in matters affecting Africa.

Icheoku asks Obama, why? If his father abandoned his mother when he did not know that his spermed child would one day be the president of America, does two wrongs now make right? An eye for and eye makes the world go blind, so said Mahatma Gandhi; so when would Barack forgive Africans for being a debit-dad to him? Did Obama forget so easily that without an African's sperm, that there would have been no Barack who later rose to become president? May be after his presidency, he will explain his actions and oversight of Africa when he writes another book, this time, "Dreams of his unfulfilled Presidency", which never factored in Africa in his scheme of things?

Unfortunately, the fate of Africa seems to be always on permanent doomed state. A matter made worse as their own very son appear to have joined other Africa's traducers in keeping Africa off the grid of continents that need help and needs to be similarly developed like the rest of the world. If a white president of America could declare a Marshall Plan that saved and revamped Europe, why did an African-African president of America not initiate a similar scheme to help Africa pull up its straps? But here we are, long gone into his eight years presidency and on the final rung and we are still discussing how abysmally and disappointingly low his presidency's interest in Africa was. Even in continents visited as president, Africa was visited the least. Equally lamentable is the clueless people leading Africa, who do not know that lobbyists exist to facilitate access and would have reached and/or petitioned Obama via them, to look more closely at Africa, towards helping them solve so many of Africa's militating problems. 

Icheoku says regrettably, when Obama's presidential legacy is finally written and the chapter on Africa comes up, it will be literally blank except for the mention that the African-African president of America killed the King of Africa Muommer Gaddafi. None of the conflicts strangulating Africa did Obama find time or considered necessary to devote his full attention to solving? Neither did he assist various African countries battling insurgencies as a son of the soil would in defense of his honor. Icheoku remembers that his then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton once termed Boko Haram as Northern marginalized youths agitating against a Christian Southern president? No African army was reinvented under Obama's watch and no African country's economy was revamped as a result of his being president. No African country got any special Free Trade Agreement status and if any, they are not enough. Talkless of industries, roads, rail and airports construction etc?

So was Obama's president a cause celebre` for Africans or a continuing curse of the blackman? What will be his lasting legacy for Africa? What did he do and what did he not do for Africa? If not now, when? If the slave reparations were not paid now, when? If as president he did not on behalf of America, apologize for slavery, when and by who else? If Obama visited every country with the highest concentration of major races in the world but avoided Nigeria, which hosts the largest concentration of black people in the world, more than 25% of black race, how does any person explain this nonchalant indifference to the black race? Anyway, the lot of African Americans in America did not improve much under his watch, talkless of Africans in Africa who were left holding the plate under a presidency they celebrated and heralded as belonging to them by proxy of a son of Africa. 

Possibly it might be what some people termed his unforgiven spirit which pitted him against Africa for his father abandoning him at childhood? Icheoku remembers very well that the late Gaddafi once proclaimed Barack Obama his son, an African son; only for the cruel irony that saw the fabled son of Africa turn against his adoptive African father and later killed the father - a case of Oedipus Rex sort of? But hey, Africa survived slavery; Africa survived colonization and continuing exploitation; Africa survived various debilitating diseases; Africa survived evolutionary changes; Africa survived incessant tribal wars, hunger and starvation; and so will Africa also survive their neglect by their own very son and first African president of America, President Barack Hussein Obama.