Index: django/conf/__init__.py
===================================================================
--- django/conf/__init__.py	(revision 7519)
+++ django/conf/__init__.py	(working copy)
@@ -84,7 +84,11 @@
         try:
             mod = __import__(self.SETTINGS_MODULE, {}, {}, [''])
         except ImportError, e:
-            raise ImportError, "Could not import settings '%s' (Is it on sys.path? Does it have syntax errors?): %s" % (self.SETTINGS_MODULE, e)
+            try:
+                from mod_python import apache
+                mod = apache.import_module(self.SETTINGS_MODULE)
+            except ImportError, e:
+                raise ImportError, "Could not import settings '%s' (Is it on sys.path? Does it have syntax errors?): %s " % (self.SETTINGS_MODULE, e)
 
         # Settings that should be converted into tuples if they're mistakenly entered
         # as strings.