Everything about Homeland South Africa totally explained
A
bantustan or
homeland was territory set aside for black inhabitants of
South Africa and
South-West Africa (now
Namibia), as part of the policy of
apartheid. Ten bantustans were established in South Africa, and ten in neighbouring South-West Africa (then under South African administration), for the purpose of concentrating their members of designated ethnic groups, thus making each of those territories ethnically homogeneous as the basis for creating autonomous nation states for South Africa's different black ethnic groups.
The term was first used in the late 1940s, and was coined from '
Bantu' (meaning 'people' in the
Bantu languages) and '
-stan' (meaning 'land of' in the
Persian,
Urdu,
Hindi and
Armenian languages, equivalent to the
Latin ending
-ia and the
Germanic -land). It was regarded as a disparaging term by some critics of the apartheid-era government's 'homelands' (from
Afrikaans tuisland). The word 'bantustan', today, is often used in a
pejorative sense when describing a country or region that lacks any real legitimacy or power, consists of several unconnected enclaves, and/or emerges from national or international
gerrymandering.
Some of the bantustans received 'independence'. In South Africa,
Transkei,
Venda,
Bophuthatswana, and
Ciskei were declared independent, while others (like
KwaZulu,
Lebowa, and
QwaQwa), received partial autonomy, but were never granted independence. In South-West Africa,
Ovamboland,
Kavangoland, and
East Caprivi were granted self-determination. The condition of sovereign independent states wasn't recognised internationally.
Creation
Well before the
National Party came to power in 1948, South African governments had established "reserves" in 1913 and 1936, with the intention of segregating black South Africans from whites. National Party Minister for Native Affairs (and later
Prime Minister)
Hendrik Frensch Verwoerd sought to build on this, introducing a series of measures that were intended to reshape South African society such that whites would be the demographic majority. The creation of the homelands or Bantustans was a central element of this strategy because blacks were to be made involuntary citizens of these homelands, losing their original South African citizenship and voting rights. This would enable whites to remain in control of South Africa.
Verwoerd argued that the Bantustans were the "original homes" of the black peoples of South Africa. In 1951, the government of
Daniel Francois Malan introduced the
Bantu Authorities Act to establish "homelands" allocated to the country's different black ethnic groups. These amounted to 13% of the country's land, the remainder being reserved for the white population. Local tribal leaders were co-opted to run the homelands, and uncooperative chiefs were forcibly deposed. Over time, a ruling black élite emerged with a personal and financial interest in the preservation of the homelands. While this aided the homelands' political stability to an extent, their position was still entirely dependent on South African support.
The role of the homelands was expanded in 1959 with the passage of the
Bantu Self-Government Act, which set out a plan called "
Separate Development". This enabled the homelands to establish themselves as self-governing, quasi-independent states. This plan was stepped up under Verwoerd's successor as prime minister,
John Vorster, as part of his "enlightened" approach to apartheid. However, the true intention of this policy was to make South Africa's blacks nationals of the homelands rather than of South Africa--thus removing the few rights they still had as citizens. The homelands were encouraged to opt for independence, as this would greatly reduce the number of black citizens of South Africa. The process was completed by the
Black Homelands Citizenship Act of 1970, which made black South Africans into citizens of the homelands, even if they lived in "white South Africa", and cancelled their South African citizenship.
In parallel with the creation of the homelands, South Africa's population was subjected to a massive programme of forced relocation. It has been estimated that 3.5 million people were forced from their homes from the 1960s through the 1980s, many being resettled in the Bantustans.
The government made clear that its ultimate aim was the total removal of the black population from South Africa.
Connie Mulder, the Minister of Plural Relations and Development, told the
House of Assembly on
7 February 1978:
» If our policy is taken to its logical conclusion as far as the black people are concerned, there will be not one black man with South African citizenship ... Every black man in South Africa will eventually be accommodated in some independent new state in this honourable way and there will no longer be an obligation on this Parliament to accommodate these people politically.
But this goal wasn't achieved. Only about 55% of South Africa's population lived in the Bantustans; the remainder lived in South Africa proper, many in
townships,
shanty-towns and slums on the outskirts of South African cities. This was, among other reasons, because the economy of white South Africa depended on access to a black labour force.
The Bantustans began to be given independence in 1976, with
Transkei the first to obtain this status. But none of them received recognition from the outside world, which regarded them as little more than
puppet states of South Africa. Indeed, all of them remained economically dependent on Pretoria. Their territories were broken up into numerous, non-contiguous enclaves, and the boundaries between these were very convoluted. In one instance, the South African embassy to Bophuthatswana had to be moved because it turned out that it had actually been built in South Africa rather than the homeland. In another instance, Transkei cut diplomatic relations with South Africa between 1978 and 1980 over a territorial dispute.
A similar policy was pursued in South African-occupied
South West Africa (present-day
Namibia), where ten Bantustans were created. (
See Bantustans in South West Africa for more on this topic.)
Life in the Bantustans
The Bantustans were generally poor, with few local employment opportunities being available.
Their single most important home-grown source of revenue was the provision of
casinos and
topless revue shows, which the National Party government had prohibited in South Africa proper as being "immoral". This provided a lucrative source of income for the local elite, who constructed
megaresorts such as
Sun City in the homeland of
Bophuthatswana. In this, and other respects, the South African Bantustans somewhat resembled the
Native American reservations in the United States and Canada, although the parallel isn't exact.
However, the homelands were only kept afloat by massive subsidies from the South African government; for instance, by 1985 in
Transkei, 85% of the homeland's income came from direct transfer payments from
Pretoria. The Bantustans' governments were invariably corrupt and little wealth trickled down to the local populations, who were forced to seek employment as "guest workers" in South Africa proper. Millions of people had to work in often appalling conditions, away from their homes for months at a time. – for example, 65% of Bophuthatswana's population worked outside the 'homeland'.
Not surprisingly, the homelands were extremely unpopular among the urban black population, many of whom lived in squalor in slum housing. Their working conditions were often equally poor, as they were denied any significant rights or protections in South Africa proper. The allocation of individuals to specific homelands was often quite arbitrary. Many individuals assigned to homelands didn't live in or originate from the homelands to which they were assigned, and the division into designated ethnic groups often took place on an arbitrary basis, particularly in the case of people of mixed ethnic ancestry.
Post-1994
With the demise of the apartheid regime in South Africa, the Bantustans were dismantled and their territory reincorporated into the Republic of South Africa. The drive to achieve this was spearheaded by the
African National Congress as a central element of its programme of reform. Reincorporation was mostly achieved peacefully, although there was some resistance from the local elites, who stood to lose out on the opportunities for corruption provided by the homelands. The dismantling of the homelands of Bophuthatswana and Ciskei was particularly difficult. In Ciskei, South African security forces had to intervene in March 1994 to defuse a political crisis.
From 1994, most parts of the country were constitutionally redivided into
new provincial governments.
Nevertheless many leaders of former Bantustans or Homelands have had a role in South African politics since their abolition.
Mangosuthu Buthelezi was chief minister of his kwa-Zulu homeland from 1976 until 1994. In post-Apartheid South Africa he's served as President of the
Inkatha Freedom Party.
Bantubonke Holomisa, who was a general in the homeland of Transkei from 1987, has served as the president of the
United Democratic Movement since 1997. General
Constand Viljoen an Afrikaner who served as chief of the
South African Defence Forces sent 1500 of his militiamen to protect
Lucas Mangope and to contest the termination of
Bophuthatswana as a homeland in 1994. He founded the
Freedom Front in 1994. Lucas Mangope, former chief of the Motsweda Ba hurutshe-Boo-Manyane tribe of the Tswana and head of Bophuthatswana is President of the
United Christian Democratic Party.
List of Bantustans
Bantustans in South Africa
The homelands are listed below with the ethnic group for which each homeland was designated. Four were nominally independent (the so-called TVBC states of the
Transkei,
Venda,
Bophuthatswana and the
Ciskei). The other six had limited self-government:
The first Bantustan was the Transkei, under the leadership of
Chief Kaizer Daliwonga Matanzima in the
Cape Province for the Xhosa nation. Perhaps the best known one was KwaZulu for the Zulu nation in
Natal Province, headed by a member of the Zulu royal family Chief
Mangosuthu ("Gatsha") Buthelezi in the name of the Zulu king.
Lesotho and
Swaziland were not Bantustans, but independent countries, and are former British Protectorates. These countries are mostly or entirely surrounded by South African territory, and are almost totally dependent on South Africa, but have never had any formal political dependence on South Africa, and were recognised as sovereign states by the international community from the time they were granted their independence by Britain in the 1960s.
Bantustans in South West Africa
Beginning in
1968, and following the 1964 recommendations of the commission headed by
Fox Odendaal, homelands (or
Bantustans) similar to those in South Africa were established in
South West Africa (present-day
Namibia). In July
1980 the system was changed to one of separate governments on the basis of ethnicity only, and not geography. These governments were abolished in May
1989 at the start of the transition to
independence. Of the ten homelands established in South West Africa, only three were granted
self-government.
The bantustans were:
Basterland
Bushmanland
Damaraland
East Caprivi (self rule 1976)
Hereroland (self-rule 1970)
Kaokoland
Kavangoland (self-rule 1973)
Namaland
Ovamboland
Tswanaland
Usage in non-South African contexts
The term "Bantustan" has also been used in a number of non-South African contexts, generally to refer to actual or perceived attempts to create ethnically-based states or regions. Its connection with apartheid has meant that the term is now generally used in a pejorative sense as a form of criticism:
"The term 'Bantustan' was used by apartheid's apologists in reference to the partition of India in 1947. However, it quickly became pejorative in left and anti-apartheid usage, where it remained, while being abandoned by the National Party in favour of 'homelands'."
In relation to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, critics of Israeli government policies have claimed that Israel seeks to implement a "bantustan model" for the Palestinian territories (See Allegations of Israeli apartheid for a fuller discussion of this parallel.)
In Canada, one Ottawa Citizen newspaper editorial criticised the largely Inuit territory of Nunavut as being the country's "first Bantustan, an apartheid-style ethnic homeland." .
The increasing numbers of small states in the Balkans, following the breakup of Yugoslavia, have also been referred to as "bantustans".
The Sinhalese government of Sri Lanka has been accused of turning Tamil areas into "bantustans".
The term has also been used to refer to Pakistan, and to the living conditions of Dalits in India.
The term has been used with regard to the sectarian policies adopted by the Protestant majority in Northern Ireland from 1920-1966.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Homeland South Africa'.
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