Nyanga, Cape Town

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Nyanga is a township in Cape Town, South Africa. Its name in Xhosa means ‘moon’ and it is one of the oldest black townships in Cape Town. It was established as a result of the migrant labor system. In the early fifties black migrants were forced to settle in Nyanga as Langa became too small. Nyanga is one of the poorest and most dangerous parts of Cape Town. Its unemployment is estimated at around 70% and HIV/AIDS is a huge community issue.

Nyanga is situated 26 kilometers from Cape Town along N2 highway, close to the Cape Town International Airport and next to the townships of Gugulethu and Crossroads.

[edit] History

Residents of Nyanga were active in joining a national call to protest against the apartheid laws passed in 1960. Later they were active in the 1976 student uprisings against the use of Afrikaans as first language in schools. Nyanga became notorious for its black on black faction fighting that was allegedly perpetrated by police in the early eighties. The local authorities (izibonda) grouped themselves according to their background and used that as their criteria when allocating land. These cultural differences were allegedly used by the police to stir up violence, and elements of the community were infiltrated by the apartheid regime. This led to emergence of the notoriously violent group called "the witdoeke" (the white scarfs).^{[citation needed]}

In the early eighties the youth targeted heavy drinking and shebeens as obstacles to political change. They destroyed shebeens with petrol bombs and stones forcing many operators to close down. The police took a demolished building that had been a shebeen and developed it into to a police station.^{[citation needed]}