Barack Obama’s step-grandmother, Sarah Obama, has died at a hospital in Kenya at the age of 99. 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 he was elected as the first black US president. Sarah Obama was the third and youngest wife of Barack Obama’s grandfather. For decades, she ran a foundation in Kenya to help educate orphans and girls, something she felt strongly about as she couldn’t read herself. She died early on Monday at a hospital in the western town of Kisumu, her daughter Marsat Onyango told Kenya’s Daily Nation newspaper. A family spokesman said Mrs Obama had been unwell for a week, but did not have Covid-19. Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta said on Twitter that Mrs Obama was “a strong, virtuous woman” and “an icon of family values”.
SOURCE: BBC