TheHILL. | INTERNATIONAL | March 29, 2021.
Barack Obama’s step-grandmother, Sarah Obama, has died at a hospital in Kenya at the age of 99.
Sarah Obama was the third and youngest wife of Barack’s grandfather; Hussein Onyango Obama.
She died in the early hours of Monday at a hospital in the western town of Kisumu, her daughter Marsat Onyango told Kenya’s Daily Nation newspaper.
Affectionately called Granny Sarah by the former president, Mrs Obama defended her grandson during his 2008 presidential campaign, when he was said to be Muslim and not born in the US.
Her home became a tourist attraction when Barack was elected as the first black US president.
For decades, the 99 year old ran a foundation in Kenya to help educate orphans and girls, something she felt strongly about as she couldn’t read herself.
Reports have that her husband, who died in 1975, fought for the British in Burma, now called Myanmar, and is reported to be the first man in his village to swap goatskin clothing for trousers.
Meanwhile, a family source said Mrs Obama had been ill for a week, but did not have Covid-19. She will be buried later today.
