HONOLULU – Even though Hawaii officials now claim to have verified the authenticity of Sen. Barack Obama's birth certificate – in hopes of ending widespread speculation and even multiple lawsuits challenging the Democrat candidate's constitutional qualification to be president – it turns out there is still reason for serious questioning.
In fact, there is considerable evidence that Obama was born in Kenya, not in Hawaii as the candidate and his campaign have maintained.
As WND reported from Honolulu last week, Gov. Linda Lingle instructed the Hawaii Department of Health to make sure no one in the press obtains access to Obama's original birth certificate. Lingle's letter to WND made clear that the original doctor-generated and hospital-released birth certificate on file with the state's health department would be released to the press if Obama so requested – but to date the candidate has made no such request.
The governor's communication with WND also left ambiguous whether the Obama birth certificate on file with the Department of Health was originally generated by a Hawaii doctor after giving birth to Obama in Hawaii, or generated in Kenya and subsequently registered by the Obama family in Hawaii.
On April 5, WND conducted a telephone interview from New Jersey to Kenya with Sayid Obama, brother of Barack Obama senior and the uncle of Sen. Barack Obama. The interview is reported in the book "The Obama Nation: Leftist Politics and the Cult of Personality" on pages 21-25, 26-28, 29, 30, 34 and 103.
In the interview, Sayid acknowledged he was not sure whether his brother, Barack Obama senior, practiced Islam or whether Barack Obama junior was born in Kenya or in Hawaii.
He did remember distinctly that Obama junior had visited Africa in 1987, then a second time in 1992 when Obama junior traveled to Kenya with his wife-to-be Michelle; and a third time, as a U.S. senator, when Obama returned with Michelle in 2006.
Sayid acknowledged that his father (Sen. Obama's grandfather) was wealthy in the Luo tribe, a practicing Muslim who traveled the world with the British, and insisted that Barack Obama senior attend school and was quite intelligent in school.
WND had scheduled a second telephone interview for April 25 with Auma Obama, Sen. Barack Obama's sister in Kenya, but Auma canceled the interview and apologized to WND after Sen. Obama's campaign forbade her or any other of the Obama family to conduct any further interviews with WND, following the interview with Sayid Obama.
The issue of the authenticity of Obama's original birth certificate is further muddied by communications from Sen. Obama's half-sister, Maya Soetoro, who has claimed Obama was born in two different Hawaii hospitals.
In a November 2004 interview with the Rainbow Newsletter, Maya told reporters her half-brother Sen. Barack Obama was born on Aug. 4, 1961, at Queens Medical Center in Honolulu; then in February 2008, Maya told reporters for the Honolulu Star-Bulletin that Obama was at the Kapiolani Medical Center for Women and Children.
Last week in Hawaii, WND retained a top private investigator with extensive FBI training and tasked with visiting both the Queens Medical Center and the Kaliolani Medical Center to investigate claims that Obama birth certificates existed at either hospital.
But the private investigator reported that on Thursday and Friday of last week, sheriff's deputies were stationed at both hospitals to fend off press inquiries about Obama's birth certificate.
On Thursday, KGMB9 News reported that Hawaii's top health official, Dr. Chiyome Fukino, was trying to defuse rumors that Barack Obama was born in Kenya by saying she had seen the birth certificate herself, but said Hawaii laws aimed at stopping identity theft prevented her from releasing the document despite multiple requests to do so.
Fukino failed to resolve the controversy by disclosing whether the "official document" she saw had been generated in a Kenyan hospital or in a Hawaiian hospital.
The controversy is further fueled by a video posted on YouTube in which Obama's Kenyan grandmother Sarah claims to have witnessed personally Obama's birth in Kenya. The YouTube.com video tape also features Sayid Obama who was interviewed by WND.
Considerable evidence still points to candidate's birth in KenyaBy Jerome R. CorsiTo date, Obama and his campaign have refused to disclose the name of the doctor delivering the candidate or the precise hospital where he was born.
The main reason doubts persist regarding Obama's birth certificate is this question: If an original Hawaii-doctor-generated and Hawaii-hospital-released Obama birth certificate exists, why wouldn't the senator and his campaign simply order the document released and end the controversy?
That Obama has not ordered Hawaii officials to release the document leaves doubts as to whether an authentic Hawaii birth certificate exists for Obama.
Rather, the failure to release the document fuels the theory – true or not – that the Obama family, shortly after Obama's birth overseas, returned to Hawaii and registered at the Hawaii Department of Health the original Obama birth certificate that had been issued by the doctor and hospital that delivered Obama in Kenya.