While most Americans were happy to celebrate Thanksgiving this week, former President Barack Obama received saddening news. According to multiple Kenyan media outlets, one of Obama’s relatives passed away on Thursday.
According to The Saturday Standard, a Kenya newspaper, Hawa Auma Magak was the former president’s last surviving paternal aunt before she reportedly died at her home in Kokal Kambero village.
Magak’s cause of death is said to have been a stroke. While The Standard listed her age as 79, another Kenyan news outlet reported that she was 80.
“Hardworking” woman
“She was admitted at Kisii County Referral Hospital and Rachuonyo South Sub-county Hospital, Homa Bay, and even tried herbal medication, but she succumbed,” her eldest son, Razick Magak, said.
The younger Magak went on to recall how his mother had worked to support the family following the death of his father, David Magak, in 1993.
“My mother sold charcoal for 40 years,” he stated. “She started selling charcoal in Kendu Bay town before moving to Oyugis town. She was hardworking and did all to make ends meet.”
Samwel Owida, a long-time resident of Hawa, shared fond memories of Magak’s time in the community, calling her “ever jovial and social.”
“No one could think she was a close relative of the most powerful man on earth, former President Obama. Death has deprived us of a role model,” Owida said.
Weird timing
Meanwhile, The East African reported that Magak was given an Islamic funeral by family members on Thursday in accordance with her Muslim faith.
It noted that she was the sister of Barack Obama, Sr. and that her death came just eight months following the passing of her mother, Mama Sarah Onyango Obama.
In his 2004 autobiography, Dreams of My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance, former President Obama stated that his father ultimately died in a car accident in Kenya.
He noted that his father and mother met in a Russian language class while both were attending the University of Hawaii.
The post Barack Obama’s aunt dead in Kenya following reported stroke first appeared on Conservative Institute.
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