| Uitenhage | |
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| — Town — | |
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Uitenhage
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| Coordinates: | |
| Country | South Africa |
| Province | Eastern Cape |
| Metropolitan Municipality | Nelson Mandela Bay |
| Time zone | SAST (UTC+2) |
Uitenhage is a South African town with 275,185 inhabitants in the Eastern Cape Province. It is well known for the Volkswagen factory located there, which is the biggest car factory on the African continent. The town's name is pronounced /ˈjuːtɨnheɪɡ/ by English speakers and [œjtənˈɦɑːxə] in Afrikaans. The city of Port Elizabeth and the small town of Despatch are located near Uitenhage.
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Uitenhage was founded on 25 April 1804 by landdrost (district magistrate) Jacob Glen Cuyler and named in honour of the Cape's Commissioner-General Jacob Abraham Uitenhage de Mist by the Dutch Cape Colony governor, Jan Willem Janssens.[1] Uitenhage formed from part of the district of Graaff Reinet (shortly after its short-lived secession) and in 1877 it became a municipality.
In 1985, police opened fire on a funeral procession in Uitenhage, killing a number of unarmed people, in an event that became notorious as an example of police oppression in South Africa under apartheid.[2][3]
In 2001 it was incorporated with Port Elizabeth and Despatch into the Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipality.
Uitenhage is known for the large industries situated there. The largest of these industries are the Volkswagen and Goodyear factories. An automotive supplier park, Alexander Park Industrial, has also been created directly next to the Volkswagen factory, thus allowing automotive component manufacturers to construct their manufacturing plants close by.
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