Malik Obama faces criticism for attacks on ex-US president Barack Obama

Malik Obama speaks during an interview on January 16, 2013 in Kogelo. Malik in 2013 unsuccessfully vied for the post of governor of Siaya County as an independent. PHOTO | TONY KARUMBA | AFP

What you need to know:

  • Mr Obama would not have been eligible to run for president in America if he had been born in Kenya.
  • Malik travelled to the US and granted interviews where he accused his half-brother of abandoning him and the rest of the family. 

The Kogelo clan has once again told off Malik Obama, the elder step-brother of former US president Barack Obama, after he revived the “birther” debate by posting an image of what he purported to be the ex-president’s Kenyan birth certificate.

Besides the alleged birth certificate, Malik posted a series of tweets in support of US President Donald Trump, who was for years the voice of the “birther” movement that questioned whether President Obama was born in the US state of Hawaii.

Mr Obama’s father was a Kenyan while his mother was American and all evidence, including an official birth certificate President Obama issued, indicates he was born in Hawaii.

Mr Obama would not have been eligible to run for president in America if he had been born in Kenya.

Alongside the forged document that claimed Mr Obama was born in Kenya, Malik wrote: “Surely. What’s this?”

The forged document claims that President Obama was born in Kenya at the “Coast Province General Hospital” and it has the exact date of President Obama’s birth of August 4, 1961.

At the time, Kenya was still under British rule and there were no provinces. Instead, there were regions.

When the Sunday Nation reached out to Malik to find out what his latest tweet was about, he responded in the combative manner of President Trump: “Crooked, dishonest and totally corrupt press and media.”

The birther debate had been used by conspiracy theorists to discredit President Obama, the first African-American to occupy the White House, forcing the White House to release a copy of his long-form birth certificate.

FAMILY ABANDONED
Before the November 2016 US elections, Trump admitted that indeed Obama was born in the US.

Malik’s uncle Said Obama told the Sunday Nation the family was not happy about the latest controversy and suggested his nephew was just seeking attention.

“I don’t want to be seen to be fighting with him but surely what he is doing is not good,” he said. “What do you get from fighting someone who is not fighting back and has even left office?

Kogelo community spokesman Nicholas Rajula also weighed in, calling Malik “an embarrassment to himself, the family and the country in general”.

“His behaviour is not strange to us, the villagers. He is suffering from big brother syndrome and thinks that the fame the former president enjoys should be his,” said Rajula.

In addition, Rajula questioned Malik’s motives. In the run-up to the election, Malik openly supported the then Republican candidate against Democrat Hillary Clinton who was backed by President Obama.

Malik travelled to the US and granted interviews where he accused his half-brother of abandoning him and the rest of the family. 

In a Fox News interview with host Sean Hannity after he was invited by the Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump for the final presidential debate, he expressed his displeasure with his step-brother.

In his book Dreams from My Father, President Obama records that Malik was his best man at his wedding with Michelle on October 3, 1992.

Malik told Fox News that his relationship with his step-brother used to be good “but … since he became president, he has changed. I can’t reach him. (I am) just disappointed. I would have thought that it would have been different. Before running for office, he was everybody’s friend.”

CRITICISED
When his brother was in Kenya for the Global Entrepreneurship Summit in 2015, Malik was initially nowhere to be seen when the President’s step grandmother Sarah, his sister Auma Obama and other family members travelled to Nairobi to meet their famous relative.

However, he later appeared in public with the US President. 

Malik, who in 2013 unsuccessfully vied for the post of governor of Siaya County as an independent, has had a hot-and-cold relationship with the former US President.

On social media, Malik came under heavy criticism for backing a theory, which is viewed by many as a racist attempt to undermine America’s first African-American president.