Up from Grass Roots

Not all the emerging leaders of Africa are as pretentious as Ghana's Nkrumah or as meddlesome as Egypt's Nasser. Across the continent from Casablanca, Tanganyika's Chief Minister Julius Nyerere sat in his sun-splashed and flyspecked capital of Dar es Salaam and contentedly contemplated his steady progress toward the day when Britain's East African possessions--his own mandated Tanganyika, plus Uganda and Kenya to the north and the offshore islands of Zanzibar--will be able to form a self-governing, independent Federation of East Africa.

An ex-mission schoolteacher whose sawed-off front teeth indelibly record his pagan tribal upbringing, Nyerere views federation as a far better solution to Africa's problems than fragmented independence. "The proliferation of independent states in Africa means a waste of manpower and money," he says. "It means weak economies and delays in development, and it will also mean the weakening of African influence in world affairs."

Then Freddie. Overall, British East Africa is almost as big as the U.S. east of the Mississippi, has vast mineral resources (iron and columbite), a flourishing agriculture (coffee, sisal, cotton), and more than 20 million people (all black except for 400,000 Asians and Arabs, 96,000 Europeans). By Nyerere's reckoning, the federation could be functioning as a political entity by early 1962.

In Zanzibar, where 75% of the world's fragrant clove supply is bought and sold, the British protectorate was pushing ahead to hold elections for a new government that will govern its own internal affairs. Kenyan and Ugandan politicians were already campaigning for their elections, which will enable both territories to claim the rights of self-government. There was a minor check a fortnight ago when Buganda's Frederick ("King Freddie") Mutesa II seceded from Uganda and declared Buganda's independence. Nobody noticed much change. Yawned one official: "The Baganda seem to be pretending that they have independence, and the Colonial Office seems to be pretending that they haven't."

Rocky Road. The road toward federation has been long and rocky. As early as the 1920s Winston Churchill, then Colonial Secretary, suggested federation of East Africa. But fearing domination by Kenya's white settlers (whose stubborn opposition to the winds of change was later to provoke the Mau Mau), black nationalists said no. Their opposition deepened when Britain federated the neighboring Rhodesias and Nyasaland in 1953 in a forced union which the blacks said served only the interests of Southern Rhodesia's white settlers. Last year Nyerere became the first East African to espouse publicly the inescapable logic of federation and to differentiate between "bad" federation imposed from above (as in Central Africa) and "good" federation that "grows upward from the grass roots."

One of 26 sons of a polygamist chief, Nyerere attended Uganda's Makarere College, where he was baptized a Roman Catholic. Later he took a master's in history and economics from Edinburgh University, returned to the bush to teach in a mission school. By his fiery oratory, he soon welded Tanganyika's 113 politically inarticulate tribes into the monolithic Tanganyika African National Union party. Unlike the Mau Mau in adjoining Kenya, Nyerere has modified his racist stand, now insists: "The struggle against colonialism must not be confused with racialism. Both the color of a man's skin and his country of origin are irrelevant to his rights and duties as a citizen." Last year Tanganyikans showed that they like Nyerere's crusading for solidarity; his party swept 70 out of 71 legislative seats.

Matter of Pride. Ideally, Nyerere argues, all four states should reach Tanganyika's stage of elected chief ministers, then federate and become free. To the amazement of other African nationalists, Nyerere would even hold up Tanganyika's final independence until her sister states have caught up. Says he: "It would break my heart to celebrate independence for Tanganyika alone." Nyerere's reason is simple: as a matter of national pride, newly independent states might be reluctant to yield new sovereignty to a federation. "After we've taken our seat at the U.N. as a sovereign independent state, have hoisted our flag and are singing our national anthem, and then Kenya and Uganda become free, shall we then say, 'Boys, we will lower these flags, abolish these anthems and vacate our seats'? Why, that goes against human nature."

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