At a Korea University conference in Seoul a few months ago, I was placed next to Julius Nyerere of Tanzania at dinner. For those of us who covered Africa more than a quarter of a century ago, Nyerere was like a saint. Incorruptible, frank, good-humored, intellectual, he could charm the most suspicious and doubtful questioners into following the flow of his logic as he expounded the need in Africa for socialism, one-party democracy, self-reliance, non-alignment...

President Julius Nyerere of Tanzania is trying to have his economic cake and eat it, too. He ended a week-long nationalization takeover Monday with an appeal for more private investment. His appeal appeared in a special article for the East African Standard, the English language daily read by most Western businessmen in Nairobi. Nyerere maintained that his nationalization of banks and other businesses in the last week had cleared the air. Investors now knew they could invest in everything else with confidence, he wrote. Nyerere also said that his country now had nothing to fear from private investment because the important things had been nationalized. "The key positions of the economy have been secured for the nation in the same way, as during a war, an army occupies the sites which dominate the countryside," Nyerere said. "We can now welcome the enterprise of private investors without reservations, because we no longer have any cause to fear the effect of their activities on our social purpose." Nyerere's appeal is likely to fall on deaf ears...

President Julius Nyerere ordered his government to take over all banks in Tanzania Monday, proving again that he's one African leader who follows up his flowery words with deeds no matter what the cost. The cost this time will be difficult to measure. But the action demonstrates that Nyerere meant exactly what he said Sunday when he announced Tanzania's new march toward socialism. According to Nyerere, Tanzania will follow its nationalization of banks by taking over all land, forests, mines, water property, oil refineries, electric power plants, communications, transport, insurance firms and other big industries in the country. Nyerere said he had nationalized the banks first because "money was more important than other things.' He announced no timetable for taking over the rest...