PHOTO | AFP This undated booking photo courtesy of the Framingham, Massachussetts Police Department shows Onyango Obama. US President Barack Obama’s uncle, Onyango “Omar” Obama, has been allowed to live in America by an immigration court. Obama was being held without bail on an immigration detainer - a status usually for people in the United States without a valid visa. AFP
By Antony Karanja
US President Barack Obama’s uncle, Onyango “Omar” Obama, has been allowed to live in America by an immigration court.
Judge Leonard Shapiro allowed Mr Onyango, 69, to become a permanent resident of the US and avoid deportation to Kenya saying that he met the criteria for obtaining a US Green Card.
The judge in his ruling said he believed Mr Onyango was a gentleman, a good neighbour and dutifully paid his taxes. He said he was applying a law that entitles immigrants who are “out of status” to become permanent residents if they arrived in the US before 1972, maintained continuous residence and are of good character.
Mr Onyango has been living in the US for the last 50 years, having arrived in the country in 1963. He had been ordered deported in 1992, but defied the order and remained in the country.
He remained undetected until he was arrested for drunken driving in 2011 in the city of Framingham just west of Boston.
After the arrest, his immigration status and details of his deportation orders became public.
He was charged for the drunken driving, but a judge continued the case for one year without a finding, saying, the charge would be dismissed if Mr Onyango did not get arrested again during that time, a programme he successfully completed.
When asked by the immigration judge if he had family in the US, Mr Onyango said: “I do have a nephew, Barack Obama. He’s the President of the United States.”
Tuesday’s ruling
With Tuesday’s ruling, Mr Onyango is now eligible to apply for permanent residence, which will grant him the right to legally work in the US and travel outside the country.
In May 2010, his sister Zeituni Onyango was granted asylum after claiming that she would be in danger if she was deported to Kenya.
Ms Onyango, who had moved to the US in 2000, had earlier sought asylum in 2004, but was ordered out of the country by Judge Shapiro.
She, however, did not leave and lived in government-owned houses, which are normally made available to legal US residents and citizens with low-income. The houses are given at no cost or at nominal rental rates.
Shortly after her second application for asylum was granted, she made headlines by saying that the US had an obligation to grant her citizenship.
“If I come as an immigrant, you have the obligation to make me a citizen,” she told a TV station.
Though both she and her brother can live legally in the US and travel in and out of the country, Ms Onyango cannot travel to Kenya because the basis for her asylum was that it was risky for her to be in Kenya.
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