Dear Editor,
I think what we saw on November 4, 2008, was beyond our wildest expectations − America has elected its first black President, Barack Obama, WOW, WOW, WOW!
I am writing you with a great sense of pride, tremendous respect for ‘white America’ and America as a whole, for demonstrating to the world that it is possible as human beings, despite the colour of our skin, cultural and religious backgrounds, irrespective of our many differences, to focus on the issues. We can transcend the negatives associated with race and ethnicity and see each in the words of Dr Martin Luther King Jr, for the “content of our character” and not the “colour of our skin,” and as being a part of one race – the human race.
What we have witnessed is a great ‘world victory’ and definitely a revolutionary movement in changing race and ethnicity in America and I strongly believe that this will have a domino effect globally.
Today, I walk with my chest a little higher, and I lift my chin a little more, not in pride and arrogance but in humility, because while it is a proud moment it is also a humbling moment, and as I try to grapple with this new fact, I am humbled by the thought of how very little we are in control of. I am also more confident and have a stronger sense of conviction that I can look at my daughter and say, “Yes you can; if Barack Obama can do it, you can too.” I can look at a young coloured boy hanging out on the streets, because he feels that some system is so fixed, that it is not worth the while for him to even try and say to him, “Yes you can.” To single mothers struggling to raise their children and believing that because of their circumstances destiny is already determined, so it does not matter whether their children acquire a sound education or not and say to them, “Yes they can be anything they want to be, and it is worth the while keeping them in school.”
My prayer, however, is as Guyanese, that we would become wise from this experience and emulate it in our own society. There are lots of lessons to be learnt; we can choose to be left behind in our old ways or transform our society into a place of new thinking, new ideologies, new goals and a new sense of unity and move forward as a country and truly as one people, one nation with one destiny.
After what we saw on November 4, 2008, I have crowned America as ‘The most mature country in the world.’ This is mature politics at its maximum. Hats off America, and respect due.
I will pray for President-elect Obama and encourage him to embrace the biblical book of Proverbs. May his days of folly be few and may wisdom be his friend.
Congratulations America! And Guyana… Yes we can!
Yours faithfully,
Audreyanna Thomas
