New Contree: 2021 No. 86http://hdl.handle.net/10394/375322024-03-29T15:37:17Z2024-03-29T15:37:17ZPolitical myth and historical reality in Nelson Mandela’s Long road to freedomPeires, Jeffhttp://hdl.handle.net/10394/375412021-09-30T04:10:53Z2021-01-01T00:00:00ZPolitical myth and historical reality in Nelson Mandela’s Long road to freedom
Peires, Jeff
2021-01-01T00:00:00ZA fool’s errand? Black Consciousness and the 1970s debate over the “Indian” in the Natal Indian CongressDesai, AshwinVahed, Goolamhttp://hdl.handle.net/10394/375402021-09-30T04:10:47Z2021-01-01T00:00:00ZA fool’s errand? Black Consciousness and the 1970s debate over the “Indian” in the Natal Indian Congress
Desai, Ashwin; Vahed, Goolam
Bantu Stephen Biko, born in Tarkastad in the Eastern Cape was murdered by the South African apartheid regime in September 1977, aged 31. The year 2021 marks the 75th anniversary of his birth. Biko remains iconic, but a figure that exists on the margins in South Africa. His impact in challenging both apartheid-imposed race categories and the dominant thinking of the African National Congress (ANC) inspired a whole generation through the 1970s. This article seeks to illustrate this through a previously under-researched topic; the debate between members of the fledgling Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) and those advancing the revival of the Natal Indian Congress (NIC). Through the mining of interviews and newspaper articles, the authors show
how BCM adherents attempted to move the planned Indian Congress into a People’s Congress that went beyond ethnic and racial boundaries. The move was ultimately defeated, but it resonated through the 1980s and creates the possibility of new ways of thinking about still prevalent apartheid racial categories in the present.
2021-01-01T00:00:00ZEmfuleni’s wastewater crisis, 2018-2021: The history of a Vaal sub-catchment problemTempelhoff, Johann W.N.http://hdl.handle.net/10394/375392021-09-30T04:12:20Z2021-01-01T00:00:00ZEmfuleni’s wastewater crisis, 2018-2021: The history of a Vaal sub-catchment problem
Tempelhoff, Johann W.N.
In 2018 the collapse of the wastewater infrastructure of Gauteng’s Emfuleni Local Municipality was responsible for a severe fish-kill in the Vaal River Barrage. Even communities downstream of the Barrage were affected. The
disaster was most evident at the riverside holiday town of Parys, tourism operations on the riverbank in the Vredefort Dome World Heritage Site and the Bloemhof Dam. Emfuleni’s crisis was the result of almost two decades of delays and underinvestment in the maintenance and upgrade of a local wastewater system earmarked for regional service delivery. Today’s Emfuleni has an illustrious history, dating back to the founding of the industrial towns of Vereeniging (1891) and Vanderbijlpark (1943). Both are situated downstream of where the Klip, Blesbokspruit and Suikerbos rivers fork into the Vaal River. Thanks to local coal mining, electricity generation and copious water supplies, industrial development thrived in the twentieth century. The 1994 demise of South Africa’s white-ruled governance system paved the way for a post-apartheid non-racial democracy. At this time there were significant changes in governance, demographics and economic development. Local population growth and the concomitant regional post-industrial development continue to have a profound impact on the Vaal River Barrage and the downstream communities. This study highlights the Integrated Vaal River system, the historical origins of today’s Emfuleni, and culminates with a discussion on the disaster of 2018 and its aftermath up until 2021.
2021-01-01T00:00:00ZEstate farming and Ndau people’s displacement from Zimbabwe into Mozambique, c.1940-2010Hlongwana, Jameshttp://hdl.handle.net/10394/375382021-09-30T04:10:52Z2021-01-01T00:00:00ZEstate farming and Ndau people’s displacement from Zimbabwe into Mozambique, c.1940-2010
Hlongwana, James
This article focuses on the development of plantation farming close to the Zimbabwe-Mozambique border and its effects on the Ndau people. Colonial incursions on the Zimbabwe/Mozambique border areas resulted in the development of estate farming in the Chimanimani/Chipinge region. European settlements in the borderland led to land expropriation by the colonial state and multi-national companies for estate farming. These estates
ranged from natural and exotic forests, coffee, tea to sugarcane plantations. The majority of the plantations lie along the Zimbabwe/Mozambique border. The estates are vast, numerous and cover a significant area of Chimanimani/Chipinge district. Apart from protecting tree and animal species, the promotion of tourism and provision of employment, the estates have assisted in the development of amenities and infrastructure in the region. In spite of the positives highlighted above, this article argues that the establishment of plantation agriculture displaced the Ndau people from their ancestral lands and pushed them into Mozambique.
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