Masai Ujiri's Other Legacy
He delivered Canada its first NBA crown...and handed a brutal dictator a global stage.
Welcome to Sports Politika, a media venture founded by investigative journalist and researcher Karim Zidan that strives to help you understand how sports and politics shape the world around us. Our mission is to offer an independent platform for accessible journalism that raises awareness and empowers understanding.
If you share this vision, please consider supporting us by joining our community and becoming a paid subscriber. We are currently running a special offer whereby you can secure a subscription at a fixed, discounted price.
On Friday, the Toronto Raptors parted ways with longtime executive Masai Ujiri—the architect behind the team’s first (and only) NBA championship.
Ujiri, who had been serving as the team’s president and vice-chairman, agreed to part ways ahead of the final year of his most recent contract extension. He had been with the Raptors for 12 years in total. It was a surprising decision by the team’s new owners, Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment, and was quickly criticized by fans as a “huge mistake.”
Ujiri’s popularity in Toronto stems from his status as the man who led the team to a golden age ahead of the COVID-19 pandemic—an era that culminated with the Toronto winning its first championship in 2019. The city has never forgotten his contribution. He was even awarded the Order of Canada—one of the country’s highest honours in recognition of outstanding achievement, dedication to the community and service to the nation.
I lived in Toronto for eight years; long enough to know how mad the city is for basketball. Mayor John Tory urged every resident to come celebrate the Raptors’ first championship and declared the following Monday “We The North Day” in Toronto, after the franchise’s slogan. Some 1.5 million fans attended the parade celebrating the Raptors’ victory, forcing city officials to shut down several subway stations near the parade. As the team arrived at the parade, the Royal Canadian Air Force performed a special Raptors flyby. The rally continued even after a nearby shooting left four victims with serious injuries.
Ujiri is a Toronto legend. Yet his legacy is far more complex. Beyond his achievements with the Raptors, Ujiri has also been a central figure in the NBA’s alliance with one of the world’s most ruthless dictators: Rwanda’s Paul Kagame.
Serving as the de facto ruler of Rwanda since 1994, Kagame drew international praise for commanding the rebel force that ended the Rwandan genocide in 1994. However, he has since ruled his country with an iron fist, committing severe and systematic human rights abuses both within Rwanda and beyond its borders. This includes forced disappearances, assassinations of political opponents, torture and state-imposed censorship.
The NBA’s relationship with Rwanda officially began in August 2015, when some of the top coaches from the league hosted a basketball camp in the Rwandan capital of Kigali as part of the Giants of Africa program. Founded by Ujiri, the non-profit organization has held youth basketball camps across the African continent every summer since 2003 with the goal of discovering basketball talent. The 2015 edition attracted 50 of the top young players in Rwanda, where they underwent intensive training at Rwanda’s largest stadium, the Amahoro Stadium.
Among those who attended the Giants of Africa camp in Kigali was Ian Kagame, the 19-year-old son of the Rwandan dictator who arrived in an armed motorcade. His older sister, Ange, also attended a portion of the camp with representatives of the Rwandan basketball federation.
In a video published by the NBA following the event, Ujiri revealed that he is a close friend of the Rwandan president.
“I am really proud of this country and proud to be a personal friend of President Kagame. I am going to his house tonight,” Ujiri said.
The following year, Kagame attended an NBA Africa luncheon with league commissioner Adam Silver and Ujiri, as part of the all-star game festivities. In 2018, he delivered a keynote speech at a reception hosted by the NBA in New York City. During the luncheon, Kagame gave a speech thanking Ujiri for his work promoting basketball on the continent before taking part in a one-on-one conversation with CNN political anchor Wolf Blitzer.
His appearance inspired indignation and headlines in the Toronto press. A Globe and Mail headline read, “Rwandan president Paul Kagame feted in Toronto despite controversy,” and a Toronto Star headline read, “NBA courts controversy with Rwandan president all-star appearance.”
“This is an embarrassment, really,” said David Himbara, a former aide turned critic of Kagame told The Toronto Star. “How do you bring somebody suspected of doing genocide in Congo to the NBA all-star game?”
At the time, Kagame’s regime had already helped launch two wars in the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), which led to the deaths of millions of people in the region. Thousands of Kagame’s soldiers and allied M23 militia continue to operate in eastern DRC, displacing hundreds of thousands of people, plundering mines rich in strategic mineral resources and leaving a trail of massacres, rapes and other gross human rights abuses.
Nevertheless, in August 2017, Giants of Africa returned to Rwanda for the third consecutive year to host a basketball camp at Amaharo Stadium. The organization also opened its first court in Rwanda, the Club Rafiki court in Kigali. The opening was attended by Kagame, who took part in the ribbon cutting ceremony with Ujiri and gave a speech thanking Ujiri for providing Rwanda with the opportunity to develop its basketball talent.
“This facility, as humble as it is, is as big as anything you can have. Because it is a spark required to light the bigger flame that we want to see develop in this sport. It says a lot about other possibilities in other areas”
In June 2018, Ujiri met with several world leaders at the G7 Summit in Quebec City, Canada, including Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Rwanda’s Kagame to discuss the growth of basketball in Africa. Two months later, Kagame attended the launch of the latest edition of the Giants of Africa camp in Kigali alongside Ujiri and NBA commissioner Adam Silver and Managing Director of NBA Africa Amadou Gallo Fall.
In 2019, the same year that the Toronto Raptors won the NBA championship, The Undefeated quoted Ujiri as saying ”when you talk about progressive and visionary, that is President Kagame.”
After Ujiri helped launch the Basketball Africa League (BAL), a premier men’s basketball league on the African continent, Rwanda secured the hosting rights for the inaugural season in 2021. Later that same year, Ujiri was awarded 2.4 hectares of land in the capital via a presidential order.
When the BAL returned to Kigali for the 2022 playoffs, Ujiri’s Giants of Africa organization hosted the inaugural Moving Sport Forward Forum to discuss the “emerging sports ecosystem in Africa.” Kagame headlined the event with a Q&A session moderated by Ujiri, who referred to Kagame as “His Excellency” and waxed poetic about the dictator’s achievements.
“You have been an incredible leader, an incredible mentor, and incredible for all of us on the continent,” Ujiri said during the session. “We see it and want to do like you’ve done it.”
By positioning Rwanda as a key hub for basketball and the NBA in Africa, Kagame was able to frame himself as a leading African figure in a sport that was among the most popular in the United States and was gaining traction across the African continent. He has since made regular appearances at NBA games—flanked by an entourage of friends and family—attended NBA summits as a guest of honour, and made Rwanda a key player in Africa’s basketball aspirations. None of this would have been possible without the help of his dear friend Ujiri.
Ujiri’s triumph in Toronto made him a hero. His alliance with Rwanda’s ruthless regime makes him complicit.
Sports Politika is a media platform dedicated to the intersection of sports, power and politics. If you like what you see, upgrade to a paid subscription ( or gift a subscription if you already have your own). We would appreciate if you could also like the post and let us know what you think in the comment section below.
Wow!!! This is mind blowing to me. I had no idea about this side of Masai Ujiri. Great work and thanks for putting this out there.
Don’t know basketball well but know he’s invested in arsenal. How these guys use the HE honorific sickens me every time.