President Joe Biden is greeted by Angolan International Minister Tete Antonio as he arrives at Quatro de Fevereiro worldwide airport within the capital Luanda, Angola on Monday, Dec. 2, 2024, on his long-promised go to to Africa.
Ben Curtis/AP
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Ben Curtis/AP
LAGOS, Nigeria — President Joe Biden arrived in Angola on Monday, on a delayed journey to Africa, his first and solely go to to the continent throughout the ultimate months of his time period in workplace.
Biden’s journey is the primary by an American president since Barack Obama traveled to Kenya and Ethiopia in 2015.
Initially scheduled in October, the President arrived within the West African island of Cabo Verde on Monday, earlier than travelling on to Angola.
This end-of-term effort has broadly been seen as partly a response to the long-established financial affect of China, whose commerce ties and investments over the previous few many years have dwarfed these of the U.S.
The journey fulfills a promise made by Biden to go to the continent throughout the Africa leaders summit in Washington DC two years in the past. It is usually the primary time a sitting U.S. president has visited both Cabo Verde – a U.S. ally and one of many few secure democracies in West and Central Africa, or Angola – an oil-rich former Portuguese colony that’s more and more an necessary U.S. companion within the area.
However the journey comes amid the controversy of his choice to pardon his son, Hunter Biden, of gun and tax convictions and comes on the finish of his presidency, lower than two months earlier than former President Trump returns to workplace.
“The message implied by the timing is hard to miss,” says Ken Opalo an affiliate professor on the College of International Service at Georgetown College in Washington D.C. “Biden had the time and stamina to visit lots of places during his four years in office, but only found time as a lame duck to visit the region. I think the timing reflects Africa’s overall strategic insignificance from the perspective of Washington foreign policy insiders.”
Biden vowed to place Africa on the centre of U.S. international coverage and raised expectations for African illustration at world establishments just like the U.N. Safety Council. However a lot of these expectations have largely not been met, stated Cameron Hudson, a senior fellow within the Africa Program on the Heart for Strategic and Worldwide Research.
“When the history is written on Biden’s Africa policy, it will be defined by a set of very ambitious expectations for remaking the global order and making sure that Africa is at the centre of that remaking.”
Whereas the African Union, the physique representing 55 member states, was given a everlasting membership of the G20, an African nation has but to be given a everlasting seat on the U.N. Safety Council, reflecting poorly on Biden’s commitments, Hudson stated.
“We have not seen Africa given a seat at the table,” he stated. “We have not seen the reforms of global institutions like the U.N. Security Council or the World Bank that the president has promised and that Washington is in a unique position to help bring about.”
A poster exhibiting an image of Angola President João Lourenço shaking fingers with US President Joe Biden is seen in Luanda on December 2, 2024 forward of the arrival of the American President in Angola.
JULIO PACHECO NTELA/AFP
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JULIO PACHECO NTELA/AFP
In Angola Biden is predicted to announce plenty of key commerce investments . He’s additionally resulting from go to the Nationwide Slavery museum there, drawing on the shared historical past of each international locations. A whole bunch of 1000’s of enslaved Africans had been taken from Angola to america, throughout the trans-Atlantic slave commerce, with the primary documented arrival recorded in Virginia in 1619.
However the cornerstone of Biden’s go to to Angola is the Lobito Hall, a U.S. backed 1,300-kilometer freight rail line, working from Angola to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), connecting to current hyperlinks from Zambia to the coast of Tanzania in East Africa. It’s seen by officers as a possible US coverage success because the hall eases the export of key minerals like cobalt and copper—assets essential for renewable power and superior expertise.
The mineral wealthy area has change into the main focus of intense competitors for entry, between China and Western international locations. The U.S. says it has raised greater than $4 billion funding on the venture, from private and non-private funds.
Biden administration officers sought to enhance relations with African international locations after Trump’s first time period in 2017, following the previous president’s disparaging remarks of African international locations and an immigration ban from Muslim majority international locations.
However whereas senior Biden administration officers made much more visits to African international locations than their predecessors, studies of rising competitors between the US and international locations like China, the UAE and Turkey don’t mirror the fact, Ken Opalo stated.
“There is no competition. China has spent almost 20 years forging impactful economic ties with almost all African countries – from trade to financing for infrastructure – while the United States and its European allies mostly viewed the continent through the lens of aid and humanitarian crises.”
Current US makes an attempt to reset its strategy in Africa might be impacted by Trump’s second presidency, whereas some analysts anticipate his administration is prone to favour financial investments over humanitarian help.
