The Basketball Africa League achieved a record cumulative attendance of over 140,000 throughout the course of the 48-game 2025 season, per the league, and NBA Africa CEO Clare Akamanzi has hailed this growth. Akamanzi was appointed NBA Africa CEO in December 2023, succeeding Victor Williams. Since moving from her previous role as CEO of the Rwanda Development Board (RDB), she has overseen continued growth in the league, which is co-organised by the NBA and FIBA. ALSO READ: Who is Clare Akamanzi, the new NBA Africa chief executive? The 2024 season had seen over 120,000 spectators in total, but 2025 saw even bigger numbers, as Morocco replaced Egypt as one of the four markets - joining fellow host countries Senegal, Rwanda and South Africa - which hosted its first playoffs at Pretoria's SunBet Arena. Previous host city Cairo had struggled to attract fans across the 2022, 2023 and 2024 seasons, but Rabat delivered bigger crowds to help the BAL boost its numbers. Akamanzi told ESPN: We're seeing the biggest numbers that we've seen every year. Every year is better than the year before. When we were starting about day two or day three of the finals, we had already reached the number that we did last year. I'm really happy about that. We're seeing growth metrics in ticket sales, merchandise sales, viewers online in YouTube - we had a close to 70% growth in terms of numbers of viewers on YouTube. I think it's the [consistent] growth [across these metrics] that I'm most proud of. The BAL has faced a struggle to achieve profitability, as reported by Bloomberg ahead of the 2024 season. However, the NBA has continued to back the league and has at least been encouraged by a sustained growth in revenue. Akamanzi continued: Of course, we are a business - and also, the commercial revenue growth is something that we're proud of. We're seeing double-digit growth every year. That's important, because that's what the business wants. Also, talent - the games are becoming more competitive. There are some records that we're seeing... Talent that's coming from Africa is going to the NBA. All of that is part of what we follow and what we measure. All of that is a positive story that we're proud of. The BAL's single-game points scoring record by a team was broken twice during the 2025 season, with eventual champions Al Ahli Tripoli scoring 115 points against Nairobi City Thunder before Armée Patriotique Rwandaise topped that with 123 against Al Ittihad Alexandria. In 2024, the Toronto Raptors' Ulrich Chomche (Cameroon) became the first former BAL and NBA Academy Africa player drafted into the NBA. Khaman Maluach (Duke Blue Devils) played three seasons in the BAL while at the academy and is expected to be among the top NBA Draft picks in 2025. Playing in a professional league has thus proven to be a major accelerator for the development of Africa's top teenage basketball talent, brought in by the BAL Elevate program - which launched in the league's second season, 2022. However, a shift in Akamanzi's mentality during her time as CEO of the Rwanda Development Board (RDB) from 2017-2023 means that she no longer views such success stories as sporting wins only, but rather wins with intrinsic value for Africa that money cannot buy. She explained: It was the partnerships at Visit Rwanda at the time that we had - even with the NBA [that were a personal turning point]. I remember, we always looked at sports as sports, but at some point, we realised that sports is actually an economic growth engine and that's why countries invest. Here in South Africa, we had our first collaboration with South African Tourism. In Rwanda, we had Visit Rwanda. In Senegal, we did a partnership with Air Senegal. I think for me, the story that tells it the best is the impact that we've seen economically. We just finished a study with a firm called Africa Practice that measured the impact that the BAL had for the first four seasons and we found that the BAL had contributed $250 million [to Africa's GDP] in the first four years of being in existence and contributed 37,000 jobs. If you look at the projection, you are looking at close to 700,000 jobs in the future. You're looking at over $5 billion in GDP. That confirms what I began to see before I joined the NBA - that sports is a whole ecosystem that can actually develop the country and contribute significantly to developing a country. Apart from the NBA, Visit Rwanda has partnerships with top European football clubs Arsenal, Bayern Munich and Paris Saint-Germain. The Rwandan government has been accused by critics of using sport to sanitise an image tarnished by human rights violations cited by the US State Department. The NBA has maintained that it will take its cue from the US Government on who it can and cannot do business with. We obviously condemn human rights issues no matter where they take place, NBA Deputy Commissioner Mark Tatum said in a previous ESPN interview. That being said, we operate in 200 countries and territories. ... And so to think that we would agree with the policies, the laws, the practices in every single one of those countries and territories that we operate or distribute our content in would be unrealistic. Under the terms of the BAL's current agreement with the RDB, the playoffs are scheduled to be hosted in Kigali in 2026 and 2028. With regards to which other markets are under consideration for the league's expansion plans, Akamanzi kept her cards close to her chest. Today, the NBA has seen about five countries that have ready-to-go arenas. We know maybe another five are maybe either at planning stage, or construction or renovation phase, Akamanzi said. I think that we're going to see a couple of new arenas coming in the next few years and that will address a major challenge - which is standardised, ready-to-go infrastructure.
