African nation vs country

African nation and country both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
African nation	Yes	No	No	No
country	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, country is a hypernym of African nation; that is, country is a word with a broader meaning than African nation:

Other hypernyms of African nation include land, state.

African nation (noun)	country (noun)
any one of the countries occupying the African continent	a politically organized body of people under a single government
	the people who live in a nation or country
	the territory occupied by a nation
	an area outside of cities and towns
	a particular geographical region of indefinite boundary (usually serving some special purpose or distinguished by its people or culture or geography)