Barack Obama's Step-Grandmother, Mama Sarah, Passes Away at 99

Mar. 29 2021, Published 9:05 p.m. ET

Former U.S. President Barack Obama has all the time been observed as a family man. He's been open about his folks' interracial relationship and his personal circle of relatives, including his relationships with his spouse and daughters. Barack and his spouse, Michelle, have made huge careers for themselves and are family names, however the prolonged members of their circle of relatives have additionally made affects in their very own tactics. 

Obama's grandparents have performed a big role in his existence over the years. And, after all, they've impacted such a lot of others as well. But who are they, and how have they formed him into the person he is nowadays?

Who are Barack Obama's grandparents?

Barack's grandparents are Madelyn Lee Payne Dunham and Stanley Armour Dunham on his mom's facet, and Habiba Akumu Obama and Sarah Onyango Obama on his father's facet. His grandparents on his mother's aspect raised him for years when he lived in Honolulu, Hawaii. In his memoir Dreams From My Father, he wrote that they let him have his freedoms rising up, and when he was sufficiently old, he chose to are living with them instead of along with his mother, Stanley Ann Dunham Soetoro, in Indonesia.

"I doubted what Indonesia now had to offer and wearied of being new all over again," Obama wrote in his memoir. "More than that, I’d arrived at an unspoken pact with my grandparents: I could live with them and they’d leave me alone so long as I kept my trouble out of sight."

In a New York Times article, Obama stated that he met his father, Barack Obama Sr., just one time when he was once 10 or 11 years outdated. But that didn't prevent the previous president from getting to know his Kenyan family. Obama had visited Kenya multiple occasions and met with his father's side of the circle of relatives, according to CNN. 

Obama's step-grandmother kicked the bucket in March of 2021.

Obama's step-grandmother on his father's facet, Sarah Obama, gave up the ghost in late March 2021. She was once at least Ninety nine years old and was once thought to be to be the matriarch of the Kenyan side of his family. Affectionately known as Mama Sarah, she reportedly kicked the bucket round 4 a.m. native time on the Jaramogi Oginga Odinga Teaching and Referral Hospital in Kisumu, Kenya. 

A circle of relatives spokesperson informed ABC that Mama Sarah did not die from COVID-19. She had even tested unfavorable for the virus and had handed from "normal diseases." She had been in the medical institution as a result of she was once in poor health for a while previously.

"My family and I are mourning the loss of our beloved grandmother, Sarah Ogwel Onyango Obama, affectionately known to many as 'Mama Sarah' but known to us as 'Dani' or Granny," Barack Obama tweeted. "We will miss her dearly, but we’ll celebrate with gratitude her long and remarkable life."

In Dreams From My Father, Obama stated he first met Mama Sarah when he visited Kenya for the primary time. They grew a bond even with a language barrier between them. 

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