Barack Obama's Historic Victory and The Great Manipur Dream

By Binalakshmi Nepram *

"The true strength of our nation comes not from the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope"
- Statement by Barack Obama, US President-elect in his victory speech, 5 November 2008

On 5 November 2008, history was made in United States of America when 47 year old Barack Obama was elected as the country's first African-American President. Millions of Americans and other friends from across the world celebrated this triumph.

In his victory speech which he delivered in Chicago minutes after he was declared President-elect, he said,

"I will never forget who this victory truly belongs to - it belongs to you... to the millions of Americans who volunteered, and organized, and proved that more than two centuries later, a government of the people, by the people and for the people has not perished from this Earth".

Many Manipuris too living within and beyond the land of their birth celebrated his victory. Within seconds of the victory, many of us wrote emails of congratulations to African American friends who are living in United States. They equally replied with gusto within minutes thanking us for our messages and wrote back saying, "The celebration here are absolutely massive".

Why did Barack Obama's victory affect many citizens around the globe? What can we as Manipuris learn from this historic victory?

Many of us were glued to the TV sets in wee hours of the morning of November 5, 2008 eagerly anticipating the magic number 270 which Obama needed to get to be the new president-elect of the United States of America.

At 9.30 am, this number became a reality and like millions of Americans and friends who were praying for a change, our prayers seems to have answered. Obama went on to get 349 electoral votes to win as against John McCain's 163. Obama in total polled 63,896,968 votes, while his opponent John McCain won 56,405,897.

Not just celebration but tears of joy filled the eyes of many Americans and friends worldwide who prayed for a change in United States. Ours too were not dry. Never before such an election held shores away from a nation affected so many of us.

Never before in the history of international politics have made such a victory made overwhelming impact. Since the end of the US Civil War - there have been just three black senators in US Congress. Only two states in United States of America namely Massachusetts and Virginia have elected a black governor. With the election of Barack Obama as US President, what many considered the politically impossible has now become a reality.

The answer to the questions as to why Barack Obama's victory affect many of us can be found in the thundering voices of many Americans who chanted "Yes, we can" during the speech yesterday and in the slogan, "Change we need" which was carried everywhere by ordinary American friends in the last 22 months when the campaign first started.

And why did Americans wanted a change? For 8 years, American government were led by Republican Party. It was during their time that the 11 September 2001 event happened and later war on Iraq and war on terror started.

The War on Terrorism (also known as the War on Terror) is the common term for the military, political and legal, and ideological conflict, and specifically for U.S. operations in response to the September 11 attacks. The way in which America started the war on Iraq led millions to march in the streets of the world stating that America does not have the right to invade a country, more so without United Nations approving it.

The harsh memory of how in the year 2003, US government under George Bush brushed aside United Nation's mandate and started the war on Iraq still remains. According to The Herald, 4372 American soldiers have died and another 67,671 have been wounded in action, injured in accidents or succumbed to illness in Iraq and Afghanistan. There are 240,000 soldiers deployed for the global war on terror. And who can forget Guantamao Bay and the stories of atrocities which have been committed therein.

The global war on terror also impacted US economy as over 3 trillion US dollars have been spent on war in Iraq alone, which also impacted the economy. The final moment which heralded end of Republic era was thus the recent economic crisis which according to International Monetary Fund is 'largest financial shock since Great Depression'.

The Bush regime brought war, deaths, debt and fear in minds of many not just ordinary American citizens but everywhere in the world.

Understanding and having struggled knowing the above mentioned realities, Barack Obama in his victory speech in Chicago on 5 November 2008 stated,

"Let us resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long...the true strength of our nation comes not from our the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope".

Historically, USA has been dominated by the ethnically diverse Whites. However, what we know as United States of America was earlier lands of millions of native American Indian people. During the colonial and independent period, wars were fought to capture the lands of the native Indians.

And later the African Americans came who are the descendants of captive Africans held in the United States from the years 1619 to 1865. The 13th amendment of the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1865, outlawed slavery in the United States and three years later in 1868, full U.S. citizenship were granted to African-Americans.

These are lots of lessons that we as people living in Manipur can learn from the recent victory of Barak Obama. Barack did not belong to the majority white population of the United States though his mother was a white American. He was always dubbed a "Black" in America because of his skin colour.

This was because his father came from Kenya. He struggled through his early years to get a good education and many a times, he hardly had any money. He did not belong to a rich American family. Many a times his mother had to buy food stamps to get food for him and the family.

Barak Obama's victory showed that it is not arms or military might, and neither bloodshed which can alone bring about change. There was no news that ballot boxes were rigged at gun-point. Neither was America under any kind of an Armed Forces Special Powers Act. America is a free land and elections took place freely and without any fear.

It was the vision of the political leadership and the faith that millions of Americans had in them which catapulted the Democratic Party into a historic win. As he mentioned in his victory speech, "The true strength of our nation comes not from the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope".

He had a dream, just like Martin Luther King did and toiled hard with the masses through decades to bring about that change.

In his beautifully written memoir which I picked up from Newark's International Liberty Airport on 23 October 2008 called "Dreams from my father", Barack Obama wrote, "In 1983, I decided to become a community organizer. There wasn't much detail to the idea; I didn't know anyone making a living that way".

But what he knew was that would bring change. He further wrote, "Change in congress, complaint and corrupt. Change in the mood of the country, manic and self-absorbed. Change won't come from the top, I would say. Change will come from a mobilized grass roots".

His vision dreamed in 1983 came true on 5 November 2008 when Barack Obama was elected 44th President of the United States at a young age of 47.

He ended his victory speech, stating,

"Let us resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long...the true strength of our nation comes not from our the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope. This is your victory... So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism; of service and responsibility where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves, but each other. In this country, we rise or fall as one nation; as one people".

The ability to rise above ethnic, religion, community, gender divide to build a new Manipur led by strong visionary leaders is also what Manipur also need at a moment. We need to find our own Barack Obama in our midst to bring the much needed change.

---

* Binalakshmi Nepram (founder of Manipur Women Gun Survivors Network), based in New Delhi, is a regular contributor to e-pao.net . She can be contacted at BNepram(at)Yahoo(dot)co(dot)in . This article was webcasted on November 06 2008.

---