Friday, January 13, 2017

Barack Obama's legacy on race in America

When he was elected president in 2008, many African Americans hoped that Barack Obama would help the United States turn a corner in its long history of racial inequality.

But America's first black president's time in office has been marred by tensions between police and black communities.

So is racial inequality in the United States better or worse than eight years ago?

Harry Horton takes a look at President Obama's legacy on race…

IN: "Sunday morning service..."
OUT: SOC
DUR: 03"15




SCRIPT:

Sunday morning service at Lomax Church in Virginia… and Pastor Samuel Whittaker is talking history.

(UPSOT)
"Some presidents we remember very easy. And some we can't even think of…"

For many African Americans here like HARVEY KINSTON, memories of Barack Obama's election in 2008 bring back hopes and dreams of long-awaited change.

"I was proud, I was happy and I was hopeful that something would happen.


COSTELLA SHACKLEFORD has been front and centre of the civil rights movement in America. She marched on Washington in 1963 with Martin Luther King Jr, and looks back fondly on the night Obama was elected.

"I was elated. Because I did vote for him. I did contribute to his campaigns. Because I never dreamed that I would live to see a black president.
"It was such an emotional night for me because when you have children of your own, you always look forward to a time when maybe they will have an opportunity to step outside the boxes that we've been boxed in.
"And that was a great opportunity for all black children to see somebody to rise above the atrocities that went on, that go on in our country.


But the songs on the streets suggest the change many hoped for wasn't delivered.
Shootings of African Americans by police have led to mass protests in major US cities.
Some have called it America's "second civil rights era" - led in part by the Black Lives Matter movement.
Many of its members have criticised President Obama for a lack of support.

"I don't think that anything's changed since President Obama's presidency."

KWAME ROSE took to Baltimore's streets to protest the death of 26-year-old Freddie Gray, who was killed in police custody.

He thinks racial relations are as bad as ever in the United States.

"Obama could've used his position as the first black president. Not to be just symbolic, but to be something of substance and to be something of a solution. So he could've done a lot more, he could've said a lot more. There was a limited amount of stuff he could've done because of congress. But he could've said a lot more to put on the forefronts of people's minds that 'I'm a black man in America, there are millions of black people in America that are oppressed and we need to do something about that'."


The expectations for Barack Obama as America's first black president were incredibly high - maybe even too high.

Perhaps his greatest legacy will be what he symbolised for race relations - rather than what he achieved.