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Obama’s grandfather’s connection to Burma

Obama’s grandfather’s connection to Burma
by Mizzima News
Thursday, 04 December 2008 18:51

The grandfather of United States’ president-elect Barack Obama served in Burma during the Second World War, according to a report by the Times.

Hussein Onyango Obama, the paternal grandfather of Barack Obama, served as a cook with the British army in Burma during the Second World War, revealed yesterday’s article.

The Kenyan soldier, after returning to his motherland from Burma, became involved in rebellion against British colonial rule and was subsequently detained and tortured, states the December 3rd report.

In Kenya, he was involved in supplying information to the Kikuyu Central Association, the group that spearheaded an independence movement that came to be known as the Mau Mau rebellion. He was arrested in 1949 and detained for two years.

The report says that during his two years’ detention he was subjected to horrific torture. Violence inflicted on Kenyan prisoners is said to have sometimes involved such barbaric implements as “castration pliers”.

Hussein Onyango Obama was born about 1895 and died in 1979.