Rwandan President Paul Kagame and NBA Commissioner Adam Silver.
As Rwandan troops tightened their grip on the capitals of DRC’s Kivu Provinces, activists protested the National Basketball Association’s close collaboration with the Rwandan regime.
Activists protested the National Basketball Association's close relationship with Rwanda outside the NBA All Star Game at San Francisco's Chase Center on Sunday, February 16. Their action was complemented by an online appeal to the NBA via their social media platforms particularly on X. The NBA has a longstanding relationship with the Rwandan dictatorship despite decades of UN documentation of its human rights abuses inside Rwanda and war crimes in the neighboring Democratic Republic of the Congo, where Rwandan troops and the Rwandan-commanded M23 militia now occupy the capital cities of Congo's North and South Kivu Provinces.
In 2021, the NBA chose to inaugurate its affiliated Basketball Africa League in Kigali, Rwanda's capital, and the league’s playoffs and finals have been held there every year since. Rwanda pays the African league millions of dollars to feature "Visit Rwanda" branding on jerseys and other promotional materials, as it does the European soccer teams Arsenal FC, Paris Saint-Germain, and FC Bayern Munich. Congolese Foreign Minister Thérèse Kayikwamba Wagner has publicly called on both the NBA and the soccer teams to end these sponsorship agreements.
In a 2024 expose titled "How the NBA got into business with an African dictator," sports media outlet ESPN accused the NBA of "sportswashing" Rwanda's reputation. Activists and even two US Senators have called on the NBA to cut its ties with Rwanda, but an NBA spokesperson told ESPN that the US government had encouraged them to do business with Rwanda and that they would continue to follow its guidance.
I spoke to Stanford graduate student and activist Fatoumata Barrie, who helped organize the protest.
ANN GARRISON: Why were you protesting outside the NBA All Star Game on Sunday?
FATOUMATA BARRIE: As the death toll mounts, the NBA is celebrating those committing genocide in the Congo, while staying silent about the horrific violence. Friend-of-the-NBA Dictator Kagame’s Rwandan Defense Forces are invading the Congo, occupying two major cities and territory almost the size of Rwanda itself, and leaving mass displacement, death, and destruction in their wake. The Congolese government and Congolese people have published letters calling for the NBA to cut its ties with the Rwandan government as long as Rwanda occupies territory in eastern Congo, and we protest to amplify these demands to the crowds coming to watch the NBA All Star Games. There must be awareness, global media, and material consequences to push for an end to the genocide. The protestors coordinated their action with the statement by global nonprofit Friends of the Congo, which uplifted our Chase Center protest and amplified the calls to cut ties.
AG: How many of you were there?
FA: More than a hundred people in the Bay Area have come to discussions in recent months to discuss how we in the Bay can act in solidarity with the Congolese people. They have hosted film screenings, discussions, or emergency briefings on the situation in the Congo. On Sunday, while our co-organizers ran social media campaigns to raise awareness, we were a group of eight organizers, professionals, teachers, and students who came together in person, pulling together an emergency protest in just 24 hours. Both the social media actions and the protest were emergency actions to make our voices heard regarding the immoral relationship between the NBA and the Rwandan dictator Kagame, whose forces are currently committing atrocities in the Congo, while the NBA “sports-washes” or cleanses his image.
AG: Did people stop to talk to you and take your flyers?
FA: We were absolutely in conversation with the crowd—that was a core purpose of the action. Facing the crowds I led loud chants including “Free Congo!” “NBA complicit in genocide!” “From the Congo to Palestine, we say no to genocide!” and “Black Lives Matter!” The crowd was particularly responsive to the Black Lives Matter chants; many passing by chanted with us, threw up their fists, and became interested in our protest.
The NBA prides itself on standing for the value of Black lives, and even the State Department says that Rwandan soldiers are in the Congo destroying Black lives. This is an opportunity for the NBA to be consistent in its stance for the value of Black life by standing with the rape victims and those killed in an unnecessary and gratuitous conflict. Surely, the NBA can exercise leadership and better judgement around a matter of life and death for millions of Africans. Other organizers held photographs taken by The Mamas, a group of 50 mothers from 13 villages across Eastern Congo; they were already surviving displacement in the Bulengo displacement camp in North Kivu at the time of the Yolé! Africa photography initiative and now are left facing militia attacks on the camps themselves with nowhere to go.
The crowd stopped by to examine these images. We passed out flyers that artists and writers in our network have created, explaining the relationship between the NBA and the Rwandan dictator, as well as sharing the most recent news of the death and destruction in Congo’s major cities of Goma and Bukavu. Many members of the crowd took the flyers being passed out, while others asked questions or joined chants as they entered or exited the area.
AG: ESPN reported that when they queried the NBA about this, an NBA spokesperson responded that the US government had encouraged them to do business with Rwanda and that they would continue to follow its guidance. What's your response to that?
FA: The NBA routinely and proudly leads in activism within sports. Courts and jerseys have been transformed to draw awareness, playoff games have been cancelled, and top players have started organizations beyond the court, all to stand up for the value of Black lives, in coordination with the Black Lives Matter movement.
This is an opportunity for the NBA to be consistent in its stance for the value of Black life by standing with the rape victims and those killed in an unnecessary and gratuitous conflict. For the NBA to wash their hands of a genocide affecting hundreds of thousands of African people, in the mother country of many of their players, as they claim they uplift Africans — this is contradictory at best and at worst is a willful shirking of responsibility and complicity in genocide. Surely, the NBA can exercise leadership and better judgment around a matter of life and death for millions of Africans.
AG: What did Chance the Rapper say while hosting the TNT pre-game?
FA: He spoke about his love for and the impact of the NBA, and when asked a question about the Superbowl halftime show, he said that the best part to him was the moment of protest, which he then amplified by shouting out to the people suffering in Sudan, Palestine, and the Congo. He is just one example of how the NBA’s biggest fans are in solidarity with these global communities suffering and fighting for their lives and human rights. The NBA’s players and fans are against genocide. We ask that the NBA organization also take a stance against genocide.
AG: In three days, on February 21, John Legend will appear at Global Citizen's Move Afrika concert in Kigali despite Rwanda's relentless aggression in DRC. Has anyone attempted to break through the wall of handlers and promoters surrounding John Legend to ask him not to condone Rwanda's aggression with this appearance?
FA: Friends of the Congo has pursued a number of angles to reach John Legend and persuade him to take a moral stance and sit this one out. Our organizers have visited the Global Citizen’s office in New York and have also called on activists to join in protest at the office. Private channels have been pursued to reach him but without positive results to date. We are attempting to convince him to join his fellow artist and musician Tems from Nigeria who cancelled her concert in Rwanda because of Rwanda’s war against its fellow African nation.
AG: Fatou, thank you for speaking to Black Agenda Report.
FA: You’re welcome.
Ann Garrison is a Black Agenda Report Contributing Editor based in the San Francisco Bay Area. In 2014, she received the Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza Democracy and Peace Prize for her reporting on conflict in the African Great Lakes region. She can be reached at [email protected]. You can help support her work on Patreon.
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