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The people of Offaly will have reason to keep a close eye on next year's US elections after it was confirmed yesterday that one of the leading candidates for the presidency has roots in the Faithful County. Research has revealed that Barack Obama, an Illinois senator and Democrat hopeful for the 2008 presidential elections, is descended from a shoemaker in Moneygall, Co Offaly.

Previous investigations had indicated that Obama's third great-grandfather on his mother's side, Fulmuth Kearney, had emigrated from Ireland to the United States in 1850. Obama's father, Barack Obama snr, was a goat-herder from Kenya, while his mother, Ann Dunham, is from Kansas. The 45-year-old senator was born in Hawaii in 1961 and is battling Hillary Clinton, among others, to be the Democratic candidate for next year's elections.