Tony Elumelu, a Nigerian businessman, joined with five other colleagues to put up $5-million in 1997 to acquire a struggling Nigerian bank. Five years later, the bank merged with another to become the largest in West Africa, employing about 25,000 people.

Mr. Elumelu, who has become one of Africa’s most prominent philanthropists, likes to contrast the results of that $5-million investment—the jobs it helped create and the tax revenue it generated for governments—with what he sees as the disappointing track record of foreign-aid money showered on Africa each year.

Tony Elumelu

The Nigerian businessman thinks it’s time for a new approach to Africa’s problems, and he has been pitching the idea in speeches to donors and businessmen and to the news media.

He calls his idea “Africacapitalism,” a …

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