United States Democratic presidential candidate, Barack Obama. - File

COLIN POWELL, former United States secretary of state, says that, while he opted not to seek election as that nation's first black president 13 years ago, Democratic candidate Barack Obama now has a good shot at the most powerful job in the world.

Powell told The Gleaner yesterday that he decided against running because he did not wish to run for political office.

"I didn't think it was the right thing for me and I didn't have the kind of passion one needs," he said.

"Now, 13 years later, a young, black man has come along who has been passionate and who has demonstrated to the American people that he has the gifts necessary to be a successful president," he added.

Powell, who has Jamaican roots, served in several Republican administrations, but recently publicly endorsed Obama, the presidential nominee of the Democratic Party, to the disappointment of Republican nominee, John McCain. Powell, being a former chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff, is a military colleague of McCain, a decorated war hero.

"Why do I think he can do it?" said Powell in prefacing an explanation to his support for Obama's presidential bid. "Well, look what he has done so far. He has pushed aside all his competitors to win the Democratic party's nomination. And now as we enter into the last few days of the campaign, he is ahead in most of the polls.

"So it is not so much a comparison to what I was thinking of 13 years ago, but it's the way in which he has presented himself to the American people and he has won their support."

He noted that the race between McCain and Obama has been closely contested, adding, "we will know next Tuesday which of them had the greatest support of the American people."

See full interview in The Sunday Gleaner.

Powell