Former President Nelson Mandela opened the largest shopping center in Soweto on Thursday in a sign of the business boom that is transforming South Africa's most famous township. The 699,654-square-foot, $86 million Maponya Mall is the latest venture by Richard Maponya, a close associate of Mandela and one of Soweto's oldest entrepreneurs. "With this action, we declare this mall open," said a beaming Mandela after cutting a large gold ribbon.

Soweto, the sprawling township in the southwest of Johannesburg, is the most populous black urban residential area in the country with about 1 million people, nearly a third of the city's total population.

It was at the center of the anti-apartheid struggle and home to the country's most important political figures, such as Mandela and fellow Nobel peace laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Today, its cosmopolitan residents continue to define black urban style in South Africa.

"I have been one of the sons of this town for a very long time. I have seen it grow," Maponya said at the opening, standing in front of a statue inspired by an iconic photograph of a dying Hector Pieterson, the youngest victim of the 1976 Soweto student uprising against apartheid.

Maponya, dubbed the "father of black retail," spoke about how he battled to access business financing as he tried to build up a career as an entrepreneur.

"I refused to listen and kept on knocking on doors. Today, I deliver to you my dream of 28 years," he said as people poured into the mall, eager to take advantage of the many opening sales.

Shopping malls, once chiefly associated with Johannesburg's wealthy northern suburbs, are sprouting up across Soweto, as black South Africans reap the benefits of 13 years of democracy and a growing economy.

Johannesburg Mayor Amos Masondo said a 2004 study showed that Sowetans spent $611 million on retail goods, but only 25 percent of this was spent in the township due to a lack of retail outlets. Since then, there has been an "explosion" of new shops in Soweto, including the Maponya Mall, he said.

"Soweto is not just undergoing a face lift," he said. "It is undergoing a radical reconstruction and the mood is one of excitement."

Sowetan Cecile Daubanes is very excited about the prospect of a new mall around the corner of her house selling anything from hair extensions to home furnishings.

"We are very happy to come to this mall. It's cheap and convenient," she said, struggling to push a shopping trolley loaded up with groceries. "There are big changes in Soweto. It is good."