President Biden is on a long-delayed visit to Africa—his first during his administration, going to Angola in an effort to show that the U.S. is still capable of building infrastructure. The aim is to promote the Lobito Corridor, a rail connection from Lobito on Angola’s Atlantic coast, through Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo, on to the Indian Ocean through Tanzania. The primary purpose is to counter China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), which is already heavily involved in the infrastructure needed to develop the cobalt, lithium and copper mines in the D.R. Congo, and the copper belt of Zambia.
Britain’s BBC is very plain in its Dec. 1 coverage of the Anglo-Americans’ intention: “Biden’s visit to oil-rich Angola seeks to underline an attempt by America to focus more on trade and heavy investment in infrastructure, in what some analysts see as the most direct counter yet to China’s influence on the continent.... Angola was firmly in the political orbit of China and Russia after independence from Portuguese colonial rule in 1975, but since taking power in 2017, President João Lourenço has steered it towards closer relations with the U.S. ‘Lourenço’s administration has seen Angolan foreign policy move away from ideology towards pragmatic multipolarity, becoming truly non-aligned,’ said Alex Vines, director of the Africa program at Chatham House,” a top intelligence agency for the British Empire.
BBC quotes Helaina Matza, the acting special coordinator for the project at the U.S. State Department: “We have a collective commitment for global support among the G7 countries of $600 billion [£470 billion] and over—through 2027.”
