Americans reject Trump, elect Biden as 46th President

It was wild jubilation across the United States as Americans rejected President Donald Trump’s second term bid by electing former Vice President, Joe Biden as the 46th President in an election said to mark the return of decency to the White House.

As the figures were tallied Saturday, Americans partied in Washington and in many cities even before the Democratic candidate scored over 74,493, 498 million of popular votes ahead of Trump’s 70, 342,023million, and 279 Electoral College votes to Trump’s 214.

His Vice President-elect, Sen. Kamala Harris, 56, also made history Saturday as the first Black woman elected into such high office in the United States, shattering barriers that have kept men – almost all of them white – entrenched at the highest levels of American politics for more than two centuries.

Speaking to Sunday Telegraph in separate interviews, former Nigeria’s Consular General in Atlanta Georgia, Ambassador Joe Keshi, a career diplomat, Ambassador Akin Fayomi, who was the Minister/Head of Political Affairs at the High Commission of Nigeria, London, and Director General of the Heritage Centre, Abuja, Dr. Katch Onunuju said Trump’s defeat represents the end of an “American nightmare”.

Ambassador Keshi noted that the election was a historic moment because the election was the third time Biden had taken a shot at the presidency, because: “Biden is a man who can unify all America; he represents everything that Donald Trump is not, and this helped him in so many ways.

Americans are exhausted from the last tiring, divisive three years of Donald Trump and want to return to normalcy. “Biden is a man full of empathy, compassion and sympathy, and it is because of this he returned to the political space. He saw everything America is going through and said look we need to restore the soul of America. Throughout his campaign that was his slogan and he said Trump was not doing the right thing.” He said under Trump, various institutions in the US are at the edge of collapse because of Trump’s pressure on them.

“You saw the way he dealt with a number of institutions which complained about his behaviour. He did not even appoint people into many offices in the last four years while a number of his Secretaries of State occupied the position in acting capacity.

“Trump brought this upon himself and this is a lesson to all politicians who should know that they hold public office in trust, not for themselves, family but for the people who elected them, and every politician must learn that when they win an election it is to serve the people.

“This unfortunately is what is going on in this country and the hoarding of the palliatives at a period when the people were suffering showed you the mindlessness of the Nigerian politicians and leaders,” he said. Keshi added that those who are spiritual would actually say that God’s time is the best. “Four years ago, he was persuaded to allow Hillary Clinton to take the shot and he believed that with his age, everything was over.

“Here was a man who bidded for the presidency first when he was in his 40s, tried again sometime later and dropped out after Iowa, now this before he made it. Many of us who have followed Biden from the beginning know that God is in control. “When you look at his struggle, you will agree that Biden has had his share of tragedies. He overcame being a stutterer, just a few days before he was elected to the Senate his first wife and daughter died in an accident.

His most favourite son later died of cancer after coming back from the warfront,” he said. Fayomi was also elated about the election of Biden, stating that it was not about his election, urging him, as a member of Barack Obama administration for eight years, to revisit Obama’s policy on Africa.

“Biden’s election did not come too much as a surprise but actually the surprise was that Donald Trump lasted this long before the final result. It also showed how divisive the American politics has become, because you would not expect Trump with all his bigotry and racism to have had up to 70 million people voting for him.

“I was expecting a landslide victory because Biden had a gentlemanly campaign, and while the votes were being counted he was urging the Americans to be calm while Trump was already shouting that the election was being rigged and had gone to court without evidence. “Imagine that mind-set.

He was not presidential at all. Indeed, the majority of world leaders will be excited that Trump did not get a second term in office. Even during the one term, he made enemies for himself. “He made enemies with the European Union; he made enemies with NATO.

He made enemies with Canada, his neighbour. He made enemies with Mexico, trying to build a wall. He called all Africans ‘shithole’ countries. He made enemies that were not even there. “He fought with Emmanuel Macron of France; he fought with Angela Markel of Germany and with virtually every country in Europe. He was impeached too by the Congress.

Nobody will shed a tear that he lost the election. In all his years he did not visit Africa, neither did he send his Vice President to attend AU meetings. He merely sent the Secretary of State, to show you the level of importance he attached to Africa.” Onunuju, in his remarks, said Trump: “Worked very hard to achieve the current result of failure and the people have voted for it. I was impressed with how the democratic managers have been managing at every point in time.”