President Barack Obama's aunt, Zeituni Onyango, on Wednesday attended the first hearing on her appeal not to be deported back to Kenya and was given until February next year to appear in court with her arguments on why she should be allowed to stay in the United States.

The 56-year-old Onyango is the half-sister of the President's father, who is Kenyan. She had applied for political asylum in 2002 but was ordered deported two years later, but has continued living in a public housing project in Massachusetts.

During her hearing in U.S. Immigration Court in Boston, Judge Leonard Shapiro set the next hearing date for Feb. 4, 2010.

The proceedings were closed to the press, but Fatimah Mateen, a court spokesperson, gave short briefing after the hearing. "The decision as to Ms. Onyango's request to stay permanently in the United States will be made during a second hearing," she is quoted by the Boston Globe as aying.

The President, who fondly called her "Aunti Zeituni" in his book "Dreams from My Father," has said that he was unaware that she was living illegally in the United States.