By GEOFFREY YORK, Toronto Globe and Mail

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa - In the latest dramatic boost to its African expansion, China is pledging $10 billion in preferential loans to Africa, along with 100 clean-energy projects and lower customs duties on up to 95 percent of African exports.

In a dusty corner of a Soweto youth center, a stack of laptop computers is sitting idle. For the dozens of Johannesburg kids playing soccer outside, the laptop revolution is temporarily stalled.

Like an archeologist of the lost harvest, Elizabeth Wambui digs through the dusty soil for the remnants of her crops. Here are the dead stalks of corn. Here are the dead potato vines. Here are the dead beans, the dead peas, the dead sorghum.

Mantsie Malatsi hunts through the gloom of her tin shack and finds an old Nelson Mandela campaign button. She carefully saved it for 15 years -- but now she wants to set fire to it.

Beneath the placid waters of Lake Volta, the shadow of death lurks in a jungle of submerged trees, where countless boats have capsized and scores of fishermen have drowned. The boats of Lake Volta have chilling names: "Judgment Day" and "Deliver Us from Evil."

Any other group of activists might be in a mood to celebrate. The HIV-AIDS lobby has been among the most successful in the world, winning an impressive $10 billion in new annual funds and tripling the level of global support for AIDS programs since 2003.

When the rapist's aunt tried to settle the matter in the traditional way by offering two cows to the victim's mother, it was already too late to stop the women activists of Lusikisiki.
They had mobilized, and they were hunting for justice. They took to the streets with loudspeakers, placards and pamphlets. They went to the police station, the hospital, the courtrooms and the school.

On the days when she can't afford three meals, Ndaloswa Bekinala cuts back to two meals and gives tea to her family instead of a proper meal.
Sometimes she has to mix corn husks into the food to make it last longer. She knows that her children and grandchildren are hungry, but they don't complain.

Chow Kwan-Lo surveys his vast factory floor and admires the silence of his garment workers. "Look how quiet they are -- look at their concentration," he marvels. "They don't even turn their heads when we're talking."

With his Homburg hats, his three-piece English-style suits and his lion-tail fly whisk, Hastings Kamuzu Banda was one of the oddest dictators in African history.