Angola: a shift towards the US. Part 2

Viktor Goncharov, New Eastern Outlook, November 27, 2024 ─ 

Back in 2009, former US President Barack Obama chose Angola, along with South Africa and Nigeria, as one of three potentially important strategic partners in Africa. Donald Trump later adhered to the same position. USA wants to see Angola as a strategic partner.

Washington will allocate another billion dollars to the Lobito Corridor project, which includes the modernisation of the 1,300km Lobito railway, as well as the construction of a modern 800km railway line that will connect Angola with Zambia. It is expected that this line will become a significant transport corridor for the transportation of important minerals, such as cobalt and copper, necessary for the production of electric vehicles and other products.

Trial steps in this direction are already in action. At the end of August this year, CNN reported that a container ship, carrying the first batch of copper shipped by rail from the DRC, left the port of Lobito. The 1,300km journey from the city of Kolwezi, where one of the world’s largest copper and cobalt reserves are located, was completed in 6 days as opposed to the 30 days it takes to deliver cargo by road (as it was done earlier).

Washington’s promised investments are far from stingy

Since the launch of this project in October, 2023, which Biden called “the largest US investment in railway infrastructure in Africa in history”, and until September, 2024, the United States plans to allocate more than $3 billion to finance projects in the Lobito Corridor zone, particularly for the development of solar energy, logistics, agriculture, healthcare and telecommunications networks.

Of this amount, $900 million has been allocated for the construction of two large solar power plants with a capacity of 500MW of renewable energy and $363 million for the construction of 186 prefabricated bridges.

In addition, during this period the African Development Bank (ADB) has also come up with $1.6 billion for the development of this zone. According to the US ‘Eurasia Review’, ADB’s participation in the implementation of such projects “will help to dispel the fears of Africans about the neo-colonial exploitation of Africa’s natural resources by the United States and the West”.

In developing bilateral ties, on October 21 of this year, the United States and Angola signed an agreement on open skies, bringing relations in the field of civil aviation to the highest level. It provides for the unrestricted access to Angolan airspace for cargo and passenger carriers of the United States.

A little earlier, in 2023, the Angolan TAAG airline signed a contract with the US Boeing for the supply of ten new Boeing-787 aircraft for a total of $3.6 billion, which, after the commissioning of the Agostinho Neto International Airport close to Luanda, will create a large aviation hub in this region.

In its relations with Angola, the United States pays particular attention to the development of democratic forms of government and the protection of fundamental freedoms and human rights, including the right to peaceful assembly and freedom of political expression, religion and beliefs.

At the same time, stubborn defenders of democracy in Washington are not at all embarrassed by the fact that the same party has been in power in Angola since the country gained independence in 1975, as, according to former US ambassador to various African countries David Shinn, “by all accounts, Angola is the most convenient African country for the United States; rich in oil and, therefore, able to pay off loans”.

Ultimately, the Americans’ promotion of their model of democracy and liberal values led to the legalisation of homosexual relationships in Angola. The new criminal code prohibits discrimination against people on the basis of sexual orientation when hiring or providing services under threat of criminal punishment for up to two years in prison.

The strengthening of the US presence in this country, ‘ISS Today’ notes, indicates not only the deepening of ties between the two countries, but also reflects its importance to the US in a region that is becoming increasingly significant geopolitically. Washington, for example, supports Luanda’s peacekeeping efforts in resolving the conflict between the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda.

Hopes for a Joe Biden visit

In implementing plans to strengthen its position in Angola, Washington attaches great importance to the upcoming visit of President Joe Biden, who is still in power, to Luanda, scheduled for the first week of December this year. Initially, this visit was planned for October 13-15, but it was postponed due to the serious consequences of Hurricane Milton, which struck the west coast of Florida at that time.

In this regard, in an article with the loud title ‘Biden’s trip to Angola to celebrate beating China at its own game’, the US ‘Eurasia Review’ emphasises that the US president intends to celebrate the successful restructuring of relations between the two countries, recognise the role of Angola as a strategic partner of the United States, as well as a regional leader, and discuss with Joao Lourenco ways of further expanding cooperation in the field of security, economic cooperation and healthcare.

Representatives of the Joe Biden administration are trying to present the development of relations with Luanda as convincing evidence of the attractiveness of the United States as a reliable partner not only for Africa, but for all countries of the developing world.

However, according to experts from the Institute for Security Studies of South Africa, the main purpose of Biden’s trip to Angola is to promote a more important geopolitical imperative of the United States: countering Chinese and Russian influence in South Africa in the broadest sense of the word – in addition to the US’ heightened interest in developing critical African mineral resources, which is explained by the need to provide the US industry with raw materials and to serve national security interests.

In this regard, these experts believe that Luanda has new opportunities to use the competition between great powers to realise its foreign policy and other goals. In any case, Washington’s increased attention to Angola contributes to the growth of its international prestige and creates opportunities to promote its economic priorities.

According to experts of the US ‘Africa Country’, the Lobito Corridor project, actively advertised by the United States, has turned into a kind of serious trump card for the political elite in Luanda to gain maximum advantages in developing relations with other foreign investors, thus expanding the field of political manoeuvring.

According to Ricardo Soares de Oliveira, professor of political science at the University of Oxford, Angolans are not forsaking their old, traditional postulates, i.e. to acquire as many partners as possible and extract the greatest benefit from interactions with them.

‘Modern Diplomacy’ notes that by deepening ties with Angola, the US administration is, in turn, trying to use the country as a testing ground for achieving its plans to counter Chinese influence in Africa, where Beijing is implementing tens of megaprojects.