City of Tshwane
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The City of Tshwane Metropolitan Municipality (also known as the City of Tshwane) is a metropolitan municipality contained mostly in the province of Gauteng, South Africa, that includes the city of Pretoria. The municipality came into existence on 5 December 2000.
It is made up of 13 former city and town councils and is managed by means of an executive mayoral system. The size of the area is more than 3,200 square kilometres and it has a population of about 2,2 million people.
Although the origin of the name "Tshwane" is not known for certain, the most plausible explanation is that it is derived from the Setswana word "tshwana", meaning a black cow [1]. During a time of drought and famine, a black cow was used as a principal part of a rainmaking ritual in which water was taken from the main river that flows through the area (later to become known as Tshwane and as the Apies River (Afrikaans: Little monkeys river), and sprinkled on a black cow. The cow was then allowed to graze freely, under the belief that wherever the cow grazed, the land would become fertile and rain would fall. The drought was accordingly broken following this ritual by such rains that the river from which the water was drawn was named "Tshwane", meaning "place of the black cow". Later, the name was transferred to the city of Pretoria as it began to develop around the Apies River.[citation needed]
Although other alternative explanations have been offered for the name, these appear to be less plausible. One other commonly put forth explanation is that it is derived from the original name given by the first (Nguni-speaking) settlers (who later became known as the Ndebele) nearby the Apies River. According to this explanation, they named it after the son of one of their chiefs, Tshwane. Some say that "Tshwane" is from the Ndebele word for "little ape" (tshwene), but this appears to be false. The Tshwane Municipality claims that Tshwane means "We are one", however, the linguistic evidence does not support this. Some Ndebele kings claim to have never heard of a chief named "Tshwane" [2].
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[edit] Controversy
The name Tshwane is sometimes also used as an alternative name for the city of Pretoria itself, and following the city council's vote of March 8, 2005, could become the city's new name if approved by the central government. Should the change take place, "Pretoria" would continue to refer to the city's central business district.
The date for the renaming, estimated to cost 1.5 billion rand (US$250m), had not yet been set by early January 2006. Even should the process of renaming the city go ahead early in 2006, the legal processes and various steps involved would make it unlikely for the change to be finalised within the year.
The change of name is seen by many as a way to recognize that blacks represent a majority in the city. The Sunday Times used the word Tshwane to refer to the Pretoria area for a short period in 2005. The state-controlled SABC also started using the term in its evening news broadcasts, although private media outlets continued to refer to the metropolitan area as Pretoria. The Pretoria News newspaper, the main paper in the metropolitan area did not appear to have plans to change its name as of early 2006, although it has adopted the slogan The paper for the people of Tshwane. The newspaper appears to experience confusion when it refers to the capital city; sometimes calling it Tshwane and sometimes Pretoria. This, together with the public backing of the name change by the editor of the Pretoria News, Philani Mgwaba [3], has led to the independence of the newspaper's editorial team being called into question. Currently, the only news media that refers to the capital city as Tshwane is the Pretoria News and the South African Broadcasting Corporation television news editions (see below).
The proposed name has evoked a strong negative reaction from some South Africans, particularly those of Afrikaner origin. Also, many businesspeople do not want to change their stationery and many feel that the cost of the name change would be better spent dealing with the countries high poverty rates and current Aids crisis. There is also an argument that, whereas the name "Pretoria" is recognized worldwide, "Tshwane" is not.
Road signs erected at the boundaries of the Tshwane Metropolitan area have been consistently defaced, with the word Tshwane replaced with the word Pretoria, presumably by South Africans opposed to the name change. The letters PTA, which are an abbreviation of "Pretoria", have also been stencilled on a number of speed limit signs .
On 21 May 2005, the Pretoria Civil Action Committee, a group consisting of business, labour, cultural, civil and political leaders opposed to the name change organised a protest against the name change in the Pretoria city centre. [4] They marched to the office of Arts and Culture Minister Pallo Jordan and handed him a petition signed by 3000 University of Pretoria students as well as various other petition documents. President FW De Klerk, a Nobel prize winner and the last president under apartheid, also raised concerns about the name change. [5].
In November 2005, the Advertising Standards Authority found that advertising proclaiming that Tshwane, rather than Pretoria, was the capital of South Africa was misleading. [6] The reason being that no city named Tshwane has yet been registered as a geographic place name, and Pretoria has not yet been renamed. A similar complaint was lodged against the SABC, who maintained they were referring to events taking place in the municipal area called Tshwane, and therefore were not misleading the public. Though the Broadcasting Complaints Commission of South Africa found that the tactic was "unhelpful" they saw no reason to prevent the SABC from using the name. [7]
Tshwane is a cross-border municipality, which includes parts of North West Province, such as Ga-Rankuwa. This has caused administrative problems, and as of late 2004, there were plans to change the provincial boundaries to include these areas in Gauteng Province.
[edit] The Pretoria Name Change Process
On 5 December 2000 a number of old Pretoria municipalities as well as others that fell outside the then Pretoria area were combined into one metropolitan area called The City of Tshwane Metropolitan Municipality. The city of Pretoria remained largely intact within this municipality. The debate around the possible name change of the city of Pretoria raged ever since.
On the 26 May 2005 the South African Geographical Names Council unanimously approved a recommendation by the Tshwane Metro Council that the name Pretoria be changed to Tshwane. [8]
The legal process involved is as follows:
- Recommendation to the Geographical Names Council.
- Council approves / rejects recommendation (Approved - 26 May 2005).
- Council gives its recommendation to Arts and Culture Minister Pallo Jordan.
- Minister approves / rejects recommendation.
- Approved / rejected name is published in the Government Gazette.
- Any person or body unhappy with the name change can complain within 1 month of above.
- The minister can consult the Geographical Names Council with concerns raised.
- The minister's decision, along with the reasons for it, are published
- The minister will then take the matter before parliament where the central government will decide on whether to change the name or not based on the information before it.
Some controversial groups have attached themselves to the Pretoria name-change issue, including the trade union Solidarity [9], which has traditionally been perceived as representing the interests of the nation's whites [10]. It and the Pretoria Civil Action Committee have threatened legal action should the name change be recommended by the minister.
As of January 2006 the name change has not yet been approved or rejected by the minister (step 4 above).
[edit] Thaba Tshwane Military Base
Although the City of Tshwane Metropolitan Municipality was only created in 2000, prior to that a military base in the city (formerly called Voortrekkerhoogte after the Voortrekkers and before that Roberts Heights after Lord Roberts), was renamed Thaba Tshwane (or Thaba Tswane).
[edit] Areas
The City of Tshwane Metropolitan Municipality consists of the following areas:
- The area formerly known as the Greater Pretoria Metropolitan Council. This council was one of the four local authorities in Gauteng province. It consisted of three local councils:
- The City Council of Pretoria
- The Council of Centurion (Formerly called Verwoerdburg.)
- The Northern Pretoria Metropolitan Substructure. This area included the industrial area known as Rosslyn as well as a township, Soshanguve, which was established to accommodate non-Tswana-speaking people when Bophuthatswana became an independent homeland. (Soshanguve is an acronym that was created to reflect the township's cosmopolitan character: Sotho, Shangaan, Nguni (Swazi, Zulu, Xhosa) and Venda.)
- Ga-Rankuwa (Established in 1961 after forced removals to the area. It is named after one of the Bakgatla headmen, Rankuwa Boikhutso.)
- Temba (Established in 1940 after forced removals.)
- Mabopane (Established in 1969.)
- Winterveld
- Pienaarsrivier (Named after the Pienaars River that runs through it, this is the smallest of Tshwane's former councils.)
- Crocodile River (This area stretches from Rosslyn/Ga-Rankuwa in the north to Lanseria Airport in the south and from the western side of Pretoria towards the Hartbeespoort Dam.)
- Wallmannsthal
- Hammanskraal
- Akasia
- Soshanguve
- Mamelodi
- Atteridgeville
[edit] Recent developments
Residents of townships in the Tshwane area, including Soshanguve and Olievenhoutbosch [11] staged violent protests in 2005 and 2006 against foreigners and poor service delivery [12].
[edit] External links
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