President Joe Biden arrived for his long-awaited first presidential visit to sub-Saharan Africa on Monday to the cheers of thousands in Angola, where he will highlight an ambitious U.S.-backed railway project meant to counter China’s influence on the continent of over 1.

Joe Biden pledged lasting U.S. engagement with Africa as he met his Angolan counterpart Joao Lourenco in Luanda on Tuesday, as part of his first and only visit to sub-Saharan Africa as U.S. president.

Joe Biden is using the first visit to Angola by a U.S. president to promote Washington’s investments in the sub-Saharan African nation and see a slavery museum, where he’ll acknowledge the trafficking of humans that once linked the nations’ economies.