In many ways, their lives offered snapshots of Kenya’s history, but they also told us something about future,” he said. “They show the enormous barriers to progress that so many Kenyans faced just one or two generations ago.”
To continue that progress, he said, Kenya needs to confront “the dark corners” of its past and wage a sustained campaign against corruption, expand its democracy, overcome ethnic division, protect human rights and work to end discrimination against women and girls.
“Kenya is at a crossroads,” he said, “a moment filled with peril but also enormous promise.”
Even as he held forth, he delicately navigated the sensitivities of his Kenyan hosts. He made the point that for democracy to thrive, “there also has to be space for citizens to exercise their rights,” without suggesting that Kenya had been closing that space or naming the human rights groups that have been targeted. He did not note that the arena where he spoke is part of a sports complex used just last year to round up Somalis for summary arrest and deportation. Instead, he acknowledged the United States’ own struggles, citing the recent shootings of nine black churchgoers in Charleston, S.C., and the dispute over flying the Confederate battle flag. “What makes America exceptional is not the fact that we’re perfect,” he said. “It’s the fact that we struggle to improve.
We’re self-critical.” Mr. Obama said Kenya’s future lay with itself. Repeating a message he espoused during his first presidential trip to Africa in 2009, he emphasized that “the future of Africa is up to Africans,” and that they should not look “to the outside for salvation.” But he vowed that the United States would help. “I’m here as a friend who wants Kenya to succeed,” he said. By Sunday afternoon, as Mr. Obama arrived at the airport to head to his next stop in Ethiopia, hundreds of people gathered to see him off, including several groups of dancers in colorful outfits, ululating and banging drums.
As he headed from his helicopter to Air Force One, Mr. Obama paused as if tempted to go over and greet them, as he does with crowds at almost any airport in the United States and many overseas. But evidently he thought better of it. He waved and smiled at them instead and headed up the stairs of his plane to depart for the last time as president.
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