WHEN my American son-in-law expressed the opinion that Barack Obama was going to become the first black President of the United States in the aftermath of his opening round caucus victory Iowa, the full weight of history bore down on me. I expressed my scepticism. As a black man, well aware of America's racial history, I could not bring myself to believe that I might in fact be witnessing an historic watershed in US affairs.

It ain't over yet. But by securing the Democratic Party's nomination as their Presidential candidate, Illinois Senator Barack Obama has already gone further than any person of colour - in the United States and worldwide.

Few would have thought they would live to see this come about.

With the suspension of the campaign of his chief rival, Hillary Clinton and her subsequent endorsement of him, Barack Obama now has a 50/50 chance of being the first person of colour elected to the office of the President of the United States.

How did this son of a white American woman and a black African father come to the point? How did he defy all of the conventional wisdom (and the hugely powerful Clinton political machine) and position himself as a potential man of destiny?

In the truest sense he is an African-American. But he does not carry in his genes the experience of slavery. His father was born in the African country of Kenya, a free- born black man.

Barack Obama calls himself the first candidate of a post-racial America and in his campaigning he never strayed from that message despite the racial fire balls which occasionally threatened to engulf him and his candidacy. Yet it was never fair to attempt to tar him with the realities of America's racial past as happened after the outbursts of his church minister, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Rev. Wright, in truth, expressed the rage that many African-Americans feel given the ongoing legacy of America's racial past.

There was a similar backlash - one that was closer to home - after Obama's wife, Michelle, commented: "For the first time in my adult life I am proud to be an American."

Every person of colour in America understood where she was coming from. Perhaps only that segment of white America which, throughout their country's history, has always taken the loyalty of the black man for granted, was surprised .

It was not that Michelle Obama was being disloyal or even unAmerican (as some right-wing commentators claimed) when she made that remark.

If anything she has earned the right to express that sentiment, standing as she does on the shoulders of those many generations of African-Americans who fought for - and often laid down their lives - for the American ideal.

Such sacrifices began with Crispus Attucks, an escaped slave who is believed to have been part African and part Native American, become the first American patriot to be martyred for the cause of American Independence, dying when British troops in Boston fired on American protesters.

Crispus Attucks was the first to fall that day and, along with the four others killed that day, would go on to be looked on as an American national hero, one who was prepared to pay the price of freedom with his own blood.

Since his death Africans, who arrived in America as slaves, have given up their lives in the the struggle for freedom beginning with the American War of Independence.

They fought in America's Civil War against the slave-holding Confederacy in considerable numbers - and with considerable courage - before going on to distinguish themselves in every subsequent conflict that America has been engaged in.

Underlying their miltary service and heroism was always the unspoken hope that one day their efforts and sacrifice would make them worthy to become full American citizens, enjoying all of the rights and freedoms of their fellow citizens.

Today, Barack Obama has emerged as a kind of "Happy Warrior" in the ongoing, political struggle for full citizenship.

And when it comes to the recently concluded (and frequently bruising) primary battles between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, what we were in fact witnessing was a clash between the aspirations of two historically disenfranchised American communities women and black people.

Interestingly enough, as the African-American community noticed early on in his campaign, Obama dared not openly speak to those aspirations. But there was no such hesitation on the part of the Clinton campaign, especially after Obama's the shock upset victory in Iowa.

The tears supposedly shed by Hillary Clinton on the eve of the subsequent New Hampshire primary, whether genuine or put on especially for the occasion, revealed that in fact the social divide which manifested itself throughout the Democratic nominating process was based far more on gender than on race.

In the American political arena, black people have often been accused of adopting arguments and positions that amount to thinly camouflaged claims of entitlement. But in fact Senator Clinton and her largely white female political support base (supplemented by a not inconsiderable number of black women) demonstrated precisely such a sense of entitlement throughout the primary season. It was a woman's "turn" to be the Democratic nominee: Clinton had earned the right and to hell with how the voters were actually marking their ballots.

Another disappointment for the Clinton campaign was the evident failure of the Clintons to benefit from their long-time connections with the black political elite in America. Black movers and shakers in politics, business and religion were supposed to marshal black voter support on their behalf. But once the Obama campaign got rolling, he racked up black voter support that reached 80 percent and beyond in some states. No wonder high-profile Clinton supporters in the black community like BET founder Robert Johnson resorted to such furious denunciations of Obama before recognising the inevitable: that blacks were flocking to the Illinois Senator no matter what their elders had to say about Clinton.

Senator Clinton also isolated herself from Obama's all-inclusive campaign approach by blatantly appealing first to the female vote, then to Hispanics and then openly stating baldly that only she could win the white working class constituency. This last claim must have come as something of a shock to the few black supporters she did manage to attract. So when it came right down to it, she willingly dumped the black community in favour of an open appeal to that section of the white community once known as "Reagan Democrats": blue collar workers not renowned for either their open-mindedness or their committment to the Democratic ideals of social progress and inclusiveness, the type who abandoned their party affiliation in the 1980s to vote for conservative icon Ronald Reagan. Twice.

In the end, as she made her belated concession speech to supporters in Washington DC last weekend, Hillary Clinton did appear to be putting forward her Plan "B", which seems to be a spot on the Democratic Presidential ticket as Obama's running-mate.

Obama and his political backers must be hoping they can find a way around such an eventuality, but the reality of politics might not make that possible. Obama might have to take her as his number two, but if she gets too pushy he can always put his wife Michelle on her to keep her (and her loose-cannon husband Bill) in line.

This year 2008 holds particular significance for some of us. For it marks the 40th anniversary of the assassinations of the dreamer and the would-be President who shared a forward-looking vision for America. Dr. Martin Luther King and Senator Bobby Kennedy were both killed in 1968. Had they lived, there's a real possibility that a very different America could have come into being, an America in which the contents of men's characters really did count for more than the colour of their skins.

America is still waiting for a leader who will attempt to bridge this racial and cultural divide. Even if at times the yearning for such leadership seems to be less intense than was once the case, all Americans face common problems regardless of their race. All of them have common aspirations.

And Obama's triumph in the primaries probably owes to the fact that an increasing number of Americans, in their heart of hearts, are finally recognising what unites them rather than what divides them.

They are tired of the cultural civil war that has been underway for decades, they are tired of the ongoing economic woes that are threatening to overshadowt the futures of their children.

If Barack Obama does become the next President of the United States, will it be because fate or providence intervened? Or because his fellow countrymen of all races and ethnic backgrounds have finally decided now is the time for a new champion to pick up the fallen mantles of Dr. King and Bobby Kennedy and to complete the journey those men were so brutally prevented from finishing?

As I've said before, may the gods of Africa protect and defend Barack Obama.