I. Obama’s Roots in Polygamy and the Ford Foundation 19Obama that he did not want to attend school because he already knew everything that was being
taught, and the teacher was a woman. Grandfather Obama shared this contempt for women, so
Senior was sent to a school 6 miles away where the teacher was a man. Only after this male teacher
beat him repeatedly did Senior learn to accept a woman teacher. Senior was often a truant, not
attending school for weeks on end, but mastering the entire subject matter just before the final
exams and coming in first in the class.
During World War II, many Kenyans were inducted into the British Army. When they returned
home, they began to support the cause of independence from colonial rule. Grandfather Obama
agreed with the demand for independence, but he refused to become associated with the
independence movements. He argued that Africans could never defeat British troops. “How can
the African defeat the white man,” he told Senior, “when he cannot even make his own bicycle? ...
That is why the black man will always lose.” (Dreams 417) Despite his refusal to join the
independence movement, Grandfather Obama was arrested by the British and held in a
concentration camp for more than six months because one of his personal enemies, an employee of
the British district commissioner, had settled a score by placing his name on the list of dangerous
subversives. When he finally returned home, his health was broken.
OBAMA SENIOR EXPELLED FROM PREP SCHOOL FOR HANKY-PANKY
Obama Senior had taken the entrance examination for the Maseno Mission School, an elite
college preparatory institution which very few Africans were allowed to attend. He was admitted to
this school and seemed to have a great future ahead of him, but he soon encountered disciplinary
problems. He insisted on violating the rules by bringing girls into his dormitory. He and his friends
stole chickens and yams from nearby farms because the dormitory food was not to their liking. At
first the teachers were indulgent because Senior was such a good student, but he was caught one too
many times and was expelled. When he returned home he was severely beaten by Grandfather
Obama, who forced him to go to Mombasa and take a job in the office of an Arab merchant. He
quarreled with the Arab and had to take a job that paid much less. He worked for a time as a
goatherd. This is the origin of BHO’s claim to be a son of a goatherd. Eventually Senior moved to
Nairobi and found work as a clerk for the British railway authority. He attended a pro-independence
meeting, and was arrested and jailed for a few days by the British. During this time Senior married
his first wife, Kezia, and soon had two children, Roy and Auma. At this time he was employed as
an office boy by an Arab merchant named Suleiman.
Up to now we have been forced to rely on candidate Obama’s own account of these events.
From this point on, we can begin to supplement this with other sources. A more detailed view of
Senior and Kezia’s early years is provided by some British journalists: ‘At 18, Barack Hussein
Obama Sr. (Senior) married a girl called Kezia from the local village. It was Kezia who remained
his one true love and to whom he always returned. She was a 16-year-old schoolgirl while Senior,
two years older, had just got his first proper job as an office clerk in Nairobi. Senior convinced
Kezia to elope with him to Nairobi. Her father, a local driver, was furious. Kezia said: “He did not
like Obama. My father and brothers came to Nairobi to bring me back. They said I had to go back to
school. When I wouldn’t, they said they would never speak to me again. Barack was also worried
about what his father (Grandfather Obama) would think because I was so young, but he gave us his
approval. He sent my mother and father 14 cows for my dowry.” Kezia and Barack Sr. set up home
in Jericho, a section of Nairobi created for government employees, and began a family. First son
Roy was born in March 1958.’ (London Daily Mail, January 27, 2007)