As the US ambassador’s car pulled into a port terminal on Angola’s Atlantic coast last month, the longshoremen queueing for work were ecstatic at the sight of the stars and stripes. “Nós amamos os Americanos!” they shouted in Portuguese, the country’s official language. “We love Americans!”
This newfound passion for Washington is surprising in a country that was once a cold war battleground, an ally of Moscow and later the largest recipient of Beijing’s loans in Africa. But it is not unwarranted. The US is helping to finance the Lobito Corridor, a revival of a 100-year-old railway line that will transport critical minerals across the wider region. It connects the resource-rich Democratic Republic of Congo, in central Africa, to Angola’s port of Lobito, to the west.
The overall project is ambitious and will cost at least $10bn, according to estimates from Angolan officials. As well as the railway, it comprises roads, bridges, telecommunications, energy, agribusiness and a planned extension to Zambia’s lucrative Copperbelt province.