Dear Editor,
America has given the world the greatest Christmas gift of 2008. Whether anyone likes it or not, whether anyone believes it or not, whether anyone accepts it or not, the Barack Obama victory has definitely rekindled new hope, renewed vision, reassurance, faith and a belief, (even with a tinge of stubbornness yet in some) in people of all races and hues across the globe. This tumultuous, momentous and historical Obama victory by a man of colour − an African American − has struck the world like a thunderbolt, and has left many dumbfounded beyond explanation.

But the late great American singer Mr Sam Cooke prophetically sang a long time ago, in a song that has been adopted as the anthem of Black Americans: “It’s been a long time coming, but a change is gonna come.” The mixture of people, the blend of faces − black, white and Latino, etc − that gathered in their hundreds of thousands to hear Obama’s victory speech, were all in a highly emotional mood and intensely focused. They hung on his every word − infants, youths, grown-ups and the elderly.

This was indeed a pleasing sight to behold that moved the viewer even here in Guyana to tears; this in itself was hope enough for the future.

This Obama victory has been so awesome, it pushed into the background almost everything America has ever done; even the Democratic Party that he represents and brought back to victory, fades into the shade in comparison to his ascendancy as President.

This explosive unprecedented racial twist in the White House, has ushered in a feeling of profound optimism, while at the same time dealing the deathblow to bigotry; it has changed the politics of America and the dreams and aspirations of people of colour in a way that’s almost immeasurable.

If only we could have gone into the mind of that African American woman, who at 106 years of age, got a chance for the very first time to vote for a black man as President of the USA, maybe we would have been able to fathom and paint a true portrait of black emotion, as represented by someone who survived the degradation of racism, someone who lived in a time when to be born black was a sin and doomed one to a life in hell.

But for now to many it’s a kind of ‘Natural Mystic’ while “the sprit moves to the mystic rhythms of drums” as we, people of colour recline (throw back) in sweet grace to savour a victory and the pride that one of our kin has been catapulted to the helm of the world’s most powerful nation, a nation that once considered us lesser mortals, and treated us as such.

But it has indeed been a long time coming, a dream deferred that never dried up like “a raisin in the sun.”
The honour and glory that so many only dreamed of and died for are ours. At last, the dawn of a new era is here.
Yours faithfully,
Frank Fyffe