Ubuntu 20.04 with .net core api and angular app connection refused

I have Ubuntu droplet and I was able to set up .net core api app on it to be run as a service. When I do curl -v http://localhost:5000/api/values I get proper ones. I do not need this api to be seen outside of the droplet nor do I need to access it from internet. I was able to setup angular app which I can I access online. Problem is that published angular app for some reason is not being able to connect to this .net core api service nor able to get api url at all. The only thing I can see in chrome is connection refused and that is all. I’ve checked access.log and error.log but they will not provide any kind of info since my guess I am not accessing from external network aka internet. Does any one know what did I miss or what else needs to be setup in order for my angular app to be able to get to http://localhost:5000/api? I can provide additional details for config of nginx but not sure how it can be relevant.