LeBron James and Will Smith Meet Angola's President
The pair visited Angola for the E1 raceboat championship, where President João Lourenço discussed boosting tourism, cinema and basketball ties with them.
The pair were in the country for a round of the E1 World Championship, an electric raceboat series in which both men hold stakes as team owners.
According to local media, Lourenço used the visit to discuss promoting Angola abroad, telling James and Smith of his particular interest in tourism, cinema and basketball.
Basketball gives that last point some substance. Angola's national side sit top of their group at the ongoing AfroBasket, unbeaten through three matches, with Mabululu and Laurindo Dilson Maria Aurélio among the scorers.
James built his public profile in part on speaking out on political and human-rights issues, prompting Trump allies at one point to tell him to "shut up and dribble." He has been far less vocal during Trump's second term, and by all accounts the Angola trip continues a pattern: engagement through business and celebrity rather than political comment.
For Angola, a meeting with two of the most recognisable names in American entertainment fits a wider push toward heritage-based tourism aimed at the African diaspora. Whether it does anything for the national team's own basketball ambitions is a separate question,
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