It is the Chinese New Year. The year 2008 is the Lunar Year 4705-4706. On the Western calendar, it falls on February 7, 2008 — the Year of the Rat. After a funeral service in Morristown, NJ  and meetings at work, I swung by the local watering hole in Orange, NJ. Cameroon had just dispatched Ghana to the spectators' stand. Praise the Lord, many appeared to be saying. There was little Nigerian sympathy for Ghanaian ECOWAS brethren; they had decapitated and sent lackluster, flightless Eagles back to Nigeria. It was a lukewarm TV watch for many in the bar, so the story switched quickly back to politics. Besides the now popular and eyewitness testimonies of Governor Sullivan Chime’s Enugu State really working, American politics dominated.

The buildup to the so-called “Super Duper Tuesday” was nerve-racking for many political pundits. Friends had called from across the world to get the latest, even when they watched cable news! Apparently, they believed I had hot, on-the-ground gist to give. The hype was so much that reports on the outcome diminished the soaring star of Senator Barack Obama. Speaking of Brother Barack, I told someone the first day I heard him speak that he was destined for higher planes. It was the last Democratic Party Convention, on the day Senator John Kerry reported for duty and later found out there was no vacancy in the White House.

It has been four short years. Obama is now an exceptional generational phenomenon. Even if he drops out of the presidential race today, he has achieved beyond our wildest expectations. He has energized the young and old of America as no one has since JFK. Caroline Kennedy, JFK’s daughter, echoed the sentiments of many when she wrote in an editorial:

"I have never had a president who inspired me the way people tell me that my father inspired them. But for the first time, I believe I have found the man who could be that president -- not just for me, but for a new generation of Americans.”

A similar message in a television advertisement by Sheila Simon, daughter of the late Senator Paul Simon of Illinois, helped Obama to win the US Senate seat in 2004, beating an imported-from–Maryland Alan Keyes, who had graced the 2000 Republican primaries with his Quixotic presidential-nomination quest.

JFK said, “Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future.” Obama is energizing a new generation of Americans to step up and take charge of their future. He is speaking to us today about a future that belongs to us all. He is asking hard questions and challenging the status quo. To the establishment, these questions are uncomfortable and even inconvenient, but the questions must be asked some day. If not now, when? If not Obama, it will be someone else. We are blessed to have Obama. It is his destiny, and I am glad he stepped up. Let the chips fall where they may.

We may not all like Obama the person, but we surely sit up and listen to him speak. Not even the fans of fairy-tales (apology to ex-President Bill Clinton) will foul the fragrance of the flowering future foundation. Like it or loath it, the message resonates. Money and military might are not everything; sometimes, it takes just little cordial interactions to heal our human habitat. That is the core of Obama Order: dismantle divisive older order and focus on newer ideas that make the world a better place.

Obama does not have all the answers, and he does not claim to have all the answers. He is simply taking his case to the people, no pretensions, no holier-than-thou attitude. What he is saying, if I hear him correctly, is that we should stop the cynicism of our societal status quo, reach beyond our fears, and do things differently… together. Can we do it?

Oh yes; we can!

Imagine if Obama were campaigning to be the president of Nigeria! A dear sister told me he would be “Ebeano” (from Ebe anyi no, literarily meaning, “Where we are” -- the place to be; in short, the new political epoch) and “Ebeanaeje” (from Ebe anyi na-eje, meaning literarily “Where we are going”—the future). I can imagine all the campus chicks parading the streets of Enugu chanting:

Obama bu ebe a no…                                  Obama is where we are

Ma o na-eje eje                                             Whether he is going

Ma o na-ana ana                                         Whether he is coming

Obama ka anyi ga-eso!                               Obama we shall follow!

With such chants across the land, Senators Hillary Clinton and John McCain (now that ex-Governor Mitt Romney has bowed out after spending $40 million of his own money!) will be analogous to the Igbo saying: “Mmanwu anakpugo ’be Beenu.” Oh yes, the Mickey Mouse masquerades would be retiring from whence they had emerged—to the house of a certain cultural custodian called “Ben”— probably to enjoy a bowl of Uncle Ben’s rice after a dance they could not complete. Their withdrawal will not stop the celebrations. Those who have the energy to dance will rock on in the village square. Those who want to entertain themselves will keep watching. As the Igbo popular parlance has it, Ndi nwe isiewu, nwe isiewu; ndi nwe nkili, nwe nkili – some walk the walk, others talk the talk.

Destiny is enshrined on our palms. If you follow the divine route, walking in tandem with your Chi, you will arrive at your destination. We will not all lead at the same time; some will never lead. He whom God has crowned a leader, no one can derail. Leadership is not about being a president. Ghandi was never prime minister or president. MLK was not a president. Mandela walked away from it. Eight years of Thabo Mbeki was not worth one month of Mandela’s four years. Who now remembers the years of the locust in Nigeria?

This is just not about Brother Barack; it is about his meaningful message, the calming communication, and his convincing case for change. His powerful presentation on the night of New Hampshire primaries was a great improvement on the moving post-Iowa Caucus delivery. Some brother has since turned the speech into a musical treat, just as Bob Marley turned Haile Selassie’s speech of February 28, 1968 into a classic called “War.”

Just when you thought it could not get any better and that the South Carolina victory speech was a bit on the low side, Obama springs another surprise and rocks us off our distrustful, daring derrieres. Addressing the doubting Thomases on the night of Tuesday, February 5th, he referred to a traditional prayer attributed to an unnamed elder of the Hopi nation of Oraibi, Arizona when he declared: "We are the ones we've been waiting for.” [http://www.communityworks.info/hopi.htm]

It was music to my ears. You see, as Bob Marley sang in Trenchtown Rock, “One good thing about music, when it hits you, you feel no pain... So hit me with music…"  Obama hits me with music. I feel no pain whatsoever. The music spells out what I have been telling my fellow Igbo men and women: You cannot wait for change; no one will make change happen for you. Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. put it in proper perspective of quotable quotes when he said, “Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle.”

Obama is fulfilling the role assigned to our generation, the continuous struggle for a change of the older order. This is why his message resonates with the young ones previously turned off by smokes-and-mirrors, political jiggery pokery. This is why record numbers are registering to vote and are voting. The older order is jittery. The establishment is afraid of the new order. The traditional Democratic political machine is no longer comfortable.

Let us bring this message closer to Nigeria, starting with the Igbo nation which I have dubbed Aladimma. I have wondered what we are doing wrong that no one has been able to energize the people with the right message, why we are not out there retiring the older order of criminal corruption and nugatory nepotism, petty politics and silly squabbles, distracting disorganization and mean madness. Then it hit me that those who bother to speak out  spend an inordinate amount of time trying to shore up the older order!

Just an example: I read recently that two apex Igbo national organizations are falling over each other trying to get the old-order and elitist members of Ohanaeze Ndiigbo to sort out their petty politics and get back to business. What business, you ask? You supply the answer! My point here is that instead of allowing the older order to melt away, instead on bouncing off the older order that has grounded itself on Udi Hills serpentine, our African people of Obama generation are busy trying to drag the crippled cargo crane up to Hilltop!

Tufiakwa!  Abomination!

Obama says, “The world is changing. The old ways will not do…. It is time for a new generation of leadership.”

Is there any Nigerian out there listening?

The dog said that those whom God has endowed with good behinds do not know how to sit. The proverbial son of a bitch is right! Those whose Chi has buttered their bread on both sides are still reaching out for cheese on the edges. What will it take for all Nigerian nations to purge themselves of the anachronistic remnants of divisive politicians and ethnic separatists posing as “nationalists”? Simple: the Obama Order, a basic truth told not to the authorities but to the people to whom power belongs.

In an address while flagging off a retreat for cabinet members and other political appointees of his administration at Nike Lake, Enugu, early January 2008, Governor Sullivan Chime of Enugu State, Nigeria, said:

“Every generation has a role assigned to it by history. Our only choice is to fulfill, not betray ours. Let us, therefore, accept the sacrifices that our assignment and mission entail, aware that when the time inevitably comes, future generation will say of you and of me that, indeed, we gave our people a new Enugu State."

I agree. In essence, Obama’s message is a new order to all men and women of good conscience to stand up and seek to set aside the dark clouds that encase our human community. Each generation is indeed destined to do great things; it is up to us to find it and fulfill it, not wait and hope for a phantom messiah.

As now late Ene Henshaw Bassey captioned his famous play, “This is our chance.”

Many Africans are still full of doubts and fears. It annoys me most that positions keep shifting as Obama erases set fears. First, he was not black enough; now he is THE black candidate—even though states with over 90% white folks, including Iowa, North Dakota, and Alaska, voted for him overwhelmingly. Yes, there is the fear that some nuts might bust his bubble. So what? Some nuts bust bubbles everyday in the streets of America. I have had an encounter with the gun-totting miscreants. Scary, yes; but life goes on. Earlier today, a nut shot his family members and turned the members of Los Angeles, California SWAT team into practice targets, killing one! Tonight, a nut shot the mayor of St Louis, MO!

We do not live every day in the valley of the shadow of death. Abraham Lincoln did not. JFK did not. Some nut nearly busted Ronald Reagan’s bubble. Today, every Republican candidate mentions his names in every paragraph! Obama will be impeached… so? Nixon was impeached. Bill Clinton was also impeached; what else is new and different?

Okay, Obama is first generation! So bloody what! Governor Bobby Jindal of Louisiana is first generation EAST Indian-American (not Native American so-called “Indian”) on both sides of his family. Obama’s mother is a corn-grown Kansas beauty and white. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger of California was not even born an American; he is Austrian-born/bred!

Then you hear that white folks are only making it easy for Obama to beat Hillary Clinton so they can install Republican McCain. This was from someone who will vote for the worst Democrat before the best Republican! My rapid response: Then vote for Obama, a supposedly “worst” Democrat, or just shut up! Vote, damn it; every vote counts! “Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery, none but ourselves can free our minds.” [Redemption Song – Bob Marley]

 I have stopped arguing with those who doubt that Obama will make it to the White House. Some submissions could be so annoying you no longer glorify the closed minds. On losing a hackneyed argument, a self-styled bar pundit said: “There is a reason why they called it the WHITE House.” It was supposed to be taken seriously but in a joke format -- something the Igbo call “njakiri.” It was not funny. Since it was Chinese New Year, I let it slide and made the resolution to avoid all arguments about Obama’s prospects because it is a no brainer; it really don’ matter any more—as we say around here.

As far as I am concerned, Obama has accomplished so much his name will forever be written in gold in the annals of US political history. The world will forever remember him as Mississippi’s Hiram Rhodes Revels, the first Black U. S. Senator and first Black in Congress (1870); Frederick Douglass, the first Black to receive a major government appointment as U.S. marshal of the District of Columbia on (1877); Jack Johnson, America's first black heavyweight boxing champion (1908); MLK of civil rights movement; Robert C. Weaver, the first Black cabinet member--Secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban (1966); Thurgood Marshall of the Supreme Court; Reginald Martinez Jackson of baseball; Arthur Ashe of tennis; Oprah of television industry; Tiger Woods of Golf; and all the other notable firsts in breaking barriers made by men.

One day in no distant future, men and women of all ages and races will be proud to wear “The Order of Obama” as an embodiment of principled position on change we can believe in, change we can achieve, and change that waits for no one because “WE are the ones we've been waiting for!” That, to me, is the essence of Obama above everything else, what Germans term "über alles," which approximates to "ebeano" – what is happening above everything else and what is of real importance.

 Everything else in embellishment.