At a housing project for the homeless she once visited as first lady, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton basked in the cheers of an adoring crowd Saturday and pronounced U.S.-South African ties on the mend after years of strain.

Clinton was in her element as she worked rope lines at the project on the outskirts of Cape Town that she had toured by herself in 1997 and then in 1998, with her husband, President Bill Clinton, in tow to see the progress.

For her third trip, a ragtag marching band welcomed her to the Victoria Mxenge Housing Project, which has grown from 18 homes to 579 since she first visited. It got underway in the early 1990s with U.S. money.

"Thank you for the progress report. I am very pleased," she said. "Congratulations."

Clinton arrived in Cape Town, on the Atlantic coast, from the capital, Pretoria, and the Indian Ocean port of Durban. In Durban, she met Saturday with the new South African president, Jacob Zuma, on a mission to improve the U.S. relationship with Africa's most prosperous nation.

The Associated Press, August 9, 2009