African Aids orphans are to be denied important food and medicine from a Sussex-based charity following the collapse of a company which owed it money.

Volunteers from Hailsham-based Computers for Charities have been forced to scrap their African aid mission just days before they were due to leave.

They were due to fly out to Africa tomorrow to deliver aid to youngsters in Zimbabwe and South Africa.

But they have learnt at the last minute a company has gone into liquidation owing them £600 that was vital to fund the project.

Charity chairman Simon Rooksby said: "We're devastated. A lot of hard work has gone into planning this and now it won't happen."

Part of the charity's work involves selling dismantled computer parts for scrap.

In February, South Wales-based Precious Metals Industries Group Ltd received half a tonne of dismantled computer parts for recycling.

It was supposed to have earnt the charity £600, which was to have gone towards funding the £3,000 African project.

But despite weeks of phoning and assurances that the money was on its way, nothing has arrived.

Now the charity has learnt the company has gone into liquidation, with no records of the £600 owed.

A meeting to discuss winding up the company, based in Neath, is being held next week but the charity has been told it will not receive a penny of the £600.

The charity now has two tonnes of food and medicine that should be for Aids orphans in storage in the Zimbabwean capital, Harare.

Mr Rooksby said: "The situation faced by these children and the elderly who look after them is dire. Without the £600 the company owes, this lifeline is perilously close to being cut."