Ghanaians sporting Barack Obama hats and T-shirts and holding portraits of the US president danced through the streets of the capital Accra early yesterday in anticipation of his arrival on a landmark visit to the country.
Obama was due to arrive in Ghana late yesterday on his first visit to sub-Saharan Africa since being elected president.
Despite tight security, which saw some 10,000 police deployed across the seaside capital, residents drummed and gyrated in the streets, with many dancing to a song about Obama composed by a radio presenter known as Black Rasta.
Street vendors did brisk trade in Obama memorabilia from keyrings and coffee mugs to huge colorful umbrellas with Obama and Ghanaian President John Atta-Mills’ portraits emblazoned on them.
From as early as 8am, police blocked off some of the major roads including the airport road, from ordinary motorists.
During his 24-hour visit, Obama and his wife Michelle were due to tour Cape Coast Castle, one of Africa’s biggest former slave trading posts.
Authorities in Cape Coast, a town some 160km west of Accra, even banned all funerals this weekend on account of Obama’s visit.
Before leaving Italy for Ghana yesterday, Obama was to meet Pope Benedict XVI for the first time, with their talks expected to both areas of agreement such as foreign policy and those that divide them, notably abortion.
Obama “recognizes that this is much more than your typical state visit,” his aide Denis McDonough said in L’Aquila, Italy, where a three-day G8 summit was winding up.
“There are issues on which they’ll agree, issues on which they’ll disagree, and issues on which they’ll agree to continue to work on going forward,” McDonough said.
Vatican expert John Allen said the two share a long list of common views: “There’s foreign policy, Islam, the environment, the poor, health care, and on and on.”
A Zurich city councilor has apologized and reportedly sought police protection against threats after she fired a sport pistol at an auction poster of a 14th-century Madonna and child painting, and posted images of their bullet-ridden faces on social media. Green-Liberal party official Sanija Ameti, 32, put the images on Instagram over the weekend before quickly pulling them down. She later wrote on social media that she had been practicing shots from about 10m and only found the poster as “big enough” for a suitable target. “I apologize to the people who were hurt by my post. I deleted it immediately when I
The governor of Ohio is to send law enforcement and millions of dollars in healthcare resources to the city of Springfield as it faces a surge in temporary Haitian migrants. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine on Tuesday said that he does not oppose the Temporary Protected Status program under which about 15,000 Haitians have arrived in the city of about 59,000 people since 2020, but said the federal government must do more to help affected communities. On Monday, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost directed his office to research legal avenues — including filing a lawsuit — to stop the federal government from sending
At first, Francis Ari Sture thought a human was trying to shove him down the steep Norwegian mountainside. Then he saw the golden eagle land. “We are staring at each other for, maybe, a whole minute,” Sture said on Monday. “I’m trying to think what’s in its mind.” The bird then attacked Sture five more times on Thursday last week, scratching and clawing the 31-year-old bicycle courier’s face and arms over 10 to 15 minutes as he sprinted down the mountain. The same eagle is believed to be responsible for attacks on three other people across a vast mountainous area of southern Norway
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for