ESPN Special Full Report: How the NBA received into enterprise with an African dictator
In the spring of 2021, the NBA launched the Basketball Africa League, its first skilled league exterior North America. The new league represents the most recent part within the NBA’s ongoing world growth; a possibility to comb for brand spanking new expertise and recruit new followers on a continent with a inhabitants nearly 5 instances the United States. But in constructing its model in Africa, the NBA has aligned itself with a person who has been known as a dictator and a warmonger, crafting a partnership that requires the league to look previous the sorts of social justice points it usually champions at residence. This is the never-before-told story of the NBA’s alliance with Rwandan President Paul Kagame.
ESPN reporter Mark Fainaru-Wada and producer Willie Weinbaum examined the partnership for greater than a yr, interviewing NBA executives and coaches, Rwandan officers and opposition figures, U.S. authorities sources, human-rights specialists and traders within the NBA’s Africa enterprise — valued at practically $1 billion as of 2021. ESPN additionally reviewed U.S. and worldwide human-rights stories and traveled twice to Rwanda.
0:00 Introduction: The NBA is aware of who Kagame is
1:19 Chapter 1: The NBA, Rwanda and Sportswashing
6:38 Chapter 2: Launching the Basketball Africa League
10:00 Chapter 3: We have an authoritarian regime
14:42 Chapter 4: Economic growth or sportswashing?
19:06 Chapter 5: Challenging the NBA
23:39 Chapter 6: What ought to the NBA do?
Content warning: This program accommodates pictures of victims of the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. Viewer discretion is suggested.
To be taught extra about this story: https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/40591644/how-nba-got-business-african-dictator
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