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Veronica Ehrenreich-Risner, PhD 1 of 35 July 31, 2022
Empowering Common Africans and Democratizing Chieftaincy:
Voluntary Rural-Rural Migration
Veronica Ehrenreich-Risner
PREPRINT SUBMISSION NOTE:
The manuscript text of this preprint is identical to the manuscript text submitted to a peer-
reviewed academic journal for consideration on July 31, 2022 at 12:03am Pacific Standard Time
(PST), except that the References and End Notes have been de-anonymized so that this
manuscript may be cited properly by other scholars.
MANUSCRIPT TEXT:
Since majority rule (post-1994), a major focus of the South African government has been re-
enforcing the roles of traditional rulers, while also introducing a democratic component to
chieftainship. In a recent forum, a participant asked the following question:
What does [your work] add to [our] understanding of what has transpired since 1994
with respect to traditional authorities?1
The author responded that in order to understand the merits of the current system of traditional
councils, one must first understand how ubukhosi (chieftainship) was manipulated to serve the
needs of the past governments, as this past informs the institution’s current state. The system of
Empowering Common Africans and Democratizing Chieftaincy: Voluntary Rural-Rural Migration
Veronica Ehrenreich-Risner, PhD 2 of 35 July 31, 2022
Bantu Authorities (BA), legislated by the Bantu Authorities Act 68/1951, was a form of
traditional rule of amakhosi (chiefs) overseen by European Bantu Affairs Commissioners,
generally known as “indirect rule”. However, the system of BA did not originate from nothing.
Rather, the system of BA evolved from earlier forms of indirect rule, the earliest of which has
been addressed at length by preeminent scholar Norman Etherington who has examined the
origins of “indirect rule in Natal” honed by Theophilus Shepstone, diplomatic agent and
secretary for native affairs 1846-75.2 Similarly, Aran MacKinnon has scrutinized the later
changes to indirect rule in the early 20th century, prior to apartheid. His work on the Zululand
Land Delimitation Commission (ZLDC) is especially salient to the discussion of indirect rule in
the former reserves of today’s KwaZulu-Natal.
INSERT: Fig. 1 Author’s representation of BA system for Bantustans and Mthunzini District.
These scholars’ work, inter alia, on the subject of indirect rule laid the foundation for my own
work on Bantu Authorities, which examines in great detail the system of BA enacted under the
apartheid government and offers analysis of today's system of traditional rule as the successor to
the system of indirect rule inscribed under the wider system of BA. (See Figure 1 which depicts
the hierarchy of the BA system.) While today's system of traditional rule has been enacted under
a non-racist majority rule government, the powers and structures delineated in the Traditional
Leadership and Governance Framework Act 41/2003 (TLGFA) largely mirror the system
inscribed under BA. Granted, terms have been renamed. “tribal authorities” are now named
“traditional councils” and “regional authorities” are “regional councils”, but the modern system
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Veronica Ehrenreich-Risner, PhD 3 of 35 July 31, 2022
of traditional rule is still overseen by the central government, now through the benevolent
Ministry of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (CoGTA), and its Department of
Cooperative Governance and Department of Traditional Affairs, which replaces the apartheid-era
Department of Bantu Administration and Development (DBAD). Furthermore, the tools
available to these departments for influencing a chief, such as giving money to a chief or
favoring one successor in a succession dispute, largely remain the same.
In understanding the majority rule government’s decision to re-appropriate the structures
of BA for modern traditional authorities, it is necessary to examine the system of BA and its
precursive structures. These structures continue to impact today’s governance of the former
reserves and further engrain the legacy of poverty. While it is vitally important to know “How
we got here?” the present is of urgent concern. As Mamhood Mamdani asserts, rural citizens of
South Africa remain subjects of their inkosi. 3 Generally, the focus of the majority-rule state has
been on shoring up communal land rights (Communal Land Rights Act 11/2004 – CLaRA) and
democratizing the powers of the chief through elected local councilors. The latter aspect of
democratizing chieftaincy is the lens by which this paper evaluates structures of the past,
although this author uses historical analysis to offer different means for achieving this goal.
Knowing the history of poverty and subjugation in the former reserves, today’s majority
rule state faces what this author terms “the rural dilemma”. This dilemma includes questions
such as “How to develop the reserves?”, “How much to fund the reserves?”, and “When and how
should the state seek to override the power of traditional rulers?” Even today, these questions
lead even the most knowledgeable administrators to grave uncertainty.
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This article seeks to resolve a substantial amount of this uncertainty by taking a different
approach. Instead of considering the “rural dilemma” from the perspective of present structures
and perspectives, this article instead scours the history of traditional rule to see if there were
answers that existed in the past. Then this article asks how those answers of the past can be
applied to solve South Africa’s current “rural dilemma.”
In this author's search for answers, one point stood out above all else. In precolonial
times, the power of chiefs was checked and balanced by their subjects’ ability to migrate and
change allegiances. I offer this possible solution to the “rural dilemma” of today: invest in the
rural African’s ability to voluntarily migrate between chiefs. By empowering common rural
Africans to voluntarily migrate between chiefs, a standard behavior in precolonial times,
democracy may naturally occur. Given that common rural Africans are poor, funds would need
to be provided in the form of grants administered by a funding agency, such as CoGTA’s
Department of Traditional Affairs.
Below, the author offers analysis based on the work of Aran MacKinnon, Norman
Etherington, and other scholars, to show that the common rural African’s ability to migrate
between chiefs was the predominant historical non-violent means of democratizing chieftainship,
and based on its proven efficacy in the past, the best option to pursue today for achieving that
same objective. Specifically, this article centers on what Aderanti Adepoju’s term “rural-rural
migration,” to which I add “voluntary” to denote the importance of agency in the decision to
migrate.4 Formal support for voluntary rural-rural migration opens up a fresh avenue for a way
forward in the former reserves.
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As Adepoju contends, “The major cause of voluntary movement of populations between
and within national borders in recent years is rooted in the initial and growing disparity in
development between and among states.” Migration, he adds, involves at least three major
actors: the migrant, the area or country of origin, and the area or country of destination. In the
case of common rural South Africans, the actors are the common rural African, the current chief,
the destination chief, and the funding agency.
To explain the critical importance of voluntary rural-rural migration in the history of
south eastern Africa, this article now offers a brief history of the subject by time period. For each
time period, the author highlights examples of migration that occurred in the former reserves,
how that migration benefitted rural commoners, and how forces beyond the control of these rural
commoners gradually constricted their ability to voluntarily migrate. In the past, commoners
could migrate freely, granting them agency and control over their own lives. But centuries of
colonization eroded that ability, leading to the situation today, where people are stuck in poverty
in the former reserves under the rule of a chief who is often less than responsive to their needs.
THE HISTORICAL OPTION TO MIGRAGE BETWEEN CHIEFS – JOHN LABAND
Historian John Laband asserts that “the power and fortunes of . . . chiefs waxed and waned with
the number of adherents they could attract to their banner.”5 As a commodity, precolonial
chieftainship must have provided sufficient incentives and reciprocity to retain adherents, who
given the option, could move to a neighboring chief during precolonial times. Historically, the
market economy of chieftainship relied much more on the adherence of a base of loyal followers
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than on the power to allocate land. Etherington shows in the precolonial era that land was not
demarcated, as chieftainships were mobile when conditions dictated.6
Laband elucidates a second point when he contends that “no chiefdom was bound
inexorably to a particular territory and its members might easily migrate elsewhere in search of
security, accumulating or shedding, adherents as they moved.”7 Hence, while commoners
migrated between chiefs, so too did chieftaincies, not yet locked into a certain territory, migrate
to find better circumstances. Neither chief nor his adherents north of the Tugela River were
demarcated into a certain “reserve” or territory until the 1902 Zululand Land Delimitation
Commission (ZLDC). Aran MacKinnon eloquently explains the efforts of the ZLDC to meet the
demands for land of both the white settler and the rural African, significantly constricting
voluntary rural-rural migration with the demarcation of “tribes” and their respective “native”
reserves. 8 Colonialism through the ZLDC and apartheid through BA codified the boundaries of
chiefdoms, and in so doing constricted the land space for chiefly allotment to the rural African.9
In 2014, acting chief Mjabulaseni Dube shared his recurrent dream during apartheid where he
cried because he had no land to give his people: “The whites ate the land.”10
Despite the reality that the ZLDC boundaries generally remain in place, common rural
Africans who hlonipa (show respect to) a chief are not legally restricted in majority-rule South
Africa from moving from one chief to another who better meets their personal needs. However,
the ability of common rural Africans to voluntarily migrate is practically restricted by the
general lack of funds and other forms of support for doing so. A history of voluntary rural-rural
migration is evinced by oral history, journals, and government documents in the following
discussion.
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PRECOLONIAL MIGRATION 1500-1850 – MAX GLUCKMAN
Social anthropologist Max Gluckman contextualizes the “Rise of the Zulu kingdom” through
journals and oral history.11 Following Vasco da Gama’s rounding the Cape of Good Hope in
1497, many European ships were wrecked on the coast of Natal. The journals of some of these
castaways survived which relate their experiences with the local people who were recorded as “a
great number of small independent tribes organized around kinship groups.”12 Gluckman cites
one journal that states a chief visiting the castaways was “escorted by only 50 warriors or so; the
force of attackers on less happy occasions was never more than 300.” According to Gluckman,
seven castaway journals corroborate that “the parties were attacked either in years of widespread
drought or after the invasion of locusts, when food was short among the natives.” Conversely,
Gluckman attests in “good seasons and after the harvest the people came dancing to meet the
Portuguese, and freely offered food for the scarce metals.”13
The survivors of the Dutch vessel Stavenisse, wrecked in 1686 south of today’s Durban,
wrote in a journal, “The natives, indeed, offered us bread and cattle for sale, . . . . For nails, bolts,
and other ironwork of the wreck, we, indeed, got some bread and corn . . . they had sometimes
fully a thousand armed men, they had everything in abundance, while we suffered from want.”14
Gluckman concludes that the early Natal tribes had rules of compassion, yet the people fought if
conditions were poor or an individual group was starved for metal needed to forge their tools and
weapons.
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While the Portuguese castaways wrote of “small independent tribes under kinship
groups,” the Dutch castaways cited groups of up to one thousand in size. Gluckman explains that
the “tribes were well-organized societies with elaborate codes of law and ethics” . . . and
“offshoots of the Bantu stock” who displaced the indigenous pastoral Bushmen.15 Gluckman
observes that Shaka's rise to power was probably the result of “tides that had been running in the
life of the African peoples for two centuries,” namely, the tides of population increase in Africa’s
interior; emigration from the interior that crowded Natal’s pasture lands; and increased contacts
with European settlers and traders.16
Gluckman examined the ostracism Nandi Bhebhe faced when she bore Sigidi
kaSenzangakhona (aka Shaka), which informs this discussion of the existence of the rural-rural
migration pattern in the precolonial era. Shaka was an illegitimate son to Senzangakhona
kaJama, the chief of the small Zulu group under Dingiswayo. Senzangakhona would father three
Zulu kings: Shaka, Dingane, and Mpande. Gluckman writes that, Nandi “was hurried into a
disgraced marriage with her lover.”17 After Shaka’s birth she bore a daughter to Senzangakhona
(Nomcoba), but she and her children were ill treated and not accepted by the tribe. The option of
migration in the early 1800s is evinced in Senzangakhona’s act of driving her away, which
triggered two more of Nandi’s consecutive rural-rural migrations.
Nandi returned to her people, the Mhlongo of Elangeni, leaving Shaka behind with his
father, where he suffered constant ridicule from his half brother. Nandi sent for Shaka but life
with the Mhlongo family proved dangerous. In this second migration, Nandi sought to protect
Shaka from assassination. According to Gluckman, Nandi and the children wandered about
finally settling at the Mthethwa people where they were well treated. Other oral accounts state
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that Nandi and her children suffered an interlapping migration.18 After leaving her Mhlongo
family, her second migration, she stayed with the Qwabe people with Gendeyana, with whom
she married and had a son, Ngwadi. But Nandi and her family were not accepted and the third
rural-rural migration to the Mthetwa people under chief Dingiswayo set the history of the Zulu
people in motion.
The Mthetwa welcomed the family and Shaka grew to become one of Dingiswayo’s
bravest warriors. Although Nandi was a single mother, she was of royal blood, so more options
were likely available to her than the common African. Still, the ability to migrate between chiefs
was what empowered Nandi to protect Shaka and her family.
Additionally, before colonialism, flexibility of land use allowed the chiefdom and its
members to migrate in search of security. According to Gluckman, “their rising numbers placed
a steadily increasing pressure on the resources of each tribe’s territory. Sections of the tribes
accordingly moved away to better lands and to independence.”19 So, not only individual
migration, but also group migration, was common practice at that time.
CHIEFTAINSHIP IN EARLY COLONIAL NATAL, 1843-1879 – JOHN LAMBERT
As argued above, formal government support for the voluntary rural-rural migration of rural
Africans evokes the role and power of chieftainship. John Lambert examines the evolution of the
institution of chieftainship through the micro study of colonial Natal from 1843-1879.20 As
Lambert argues, “A particularly far-reaching measure resulted from the colonial concept of
chiefdoms as “tribes”, a concept that was accompanied by a tighter territorial definition of
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chiefship . . . .” This concept, he continues, “arose from the attempt to confine chiefdoms to
clearly-defined geographical areas with all Africans in an area under one chief.”21 As
Etherington asserts, precolonial Africans identified themselves by the chiefs they khonzed (paid
tribute to), not by the territory.22 But the colonial office wanted Africans immobilized for ease of
administration and conflated chief and ward under one term, “tribe.”
In 1843, the British Colonial Office annexed Natal, the land between the Tugela and the
Mzimkhulu Rivers. Sir Theophilus Shepstone served as diplomatic agent (1845-53) and later as
secretary for native affairs (1853-75) and developed the Shepstone system of indirect rule to
serve the colonial intention of segregating all Africans onto demarcated tribal lands.23 Given the
white settlers’ antagonism to African reserves only seven reserves were demarcated, and with the
least desirable land. In the late 1860s, reserves were demarcated beyond the Mkomanzi River,
for a total of two million acres. Still, the reserves could only accommodate half of the African
population and the colonial intention of separate development was deprioritized until apartheid.
Yet, several mechanisms were put in place between Natal’s annexation and the Anglo-Zulu War
that destroyed Zululand as an independent nation. These mechanisms would in turn obstruct the
common African’s ability to migrate voluntarily.
Most importantly, in 1849, an Order in Council established a separate administrative
system for the Africans of Natal.24 Although the colonial office acknowledged the authority of
chiefs, it also appropriated and relegated the powers of chiefs as subservient to that of colonial
agents under the rule of the Lieutenant-Governor, deemed the Supreme Chief over the Africans,
who could appoint and remove chiefs, to be overseen by “on the ground” magistrates as
Administrators of Native Law. In 1863, the colonial office further emphasized the status of
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chiefs as government servants by providing nominal salaries, which distorted and confused the
role of ubukhosi, who served both as guardian of his people and as servant of the colonial
office.25
Mechanisms evinced by 1879 relevant to this article on migration are sevenfold: 1) the
encroachment on chieftainship powers by colonial rule under magistrates; 2) the assignment of
criminal jurisdiction to magistrates; 3) the repurposing of chiefs as tax collectors and labor
suppliers for the colonial office; 4) the deposing of “unloyal” chiefs and the appointment of new
chiefs loyal to the colonial office; 5) the demarcation of lands for chiefs and adherents; 6) the
appointment of non-hereditary chiefs, and 7) the compensation of chiefs for their role as servants
of the colonial office. The above processes limited the power of chiefs and, in turn, restricted the
common rural Africans ability to migrate voluntarily.
Against the onslaught of mechanisms instituted to containerize their people, initially, the
personal agency of chiefs remained strong. Yet as land evaporated and Shepstone pushed for
“closer settlements,” deploying harsh reprisals for chiefs who ignored his orders, in time
chieftainship was molded into the colonial framework of indirect rule.26 Instances of note that
show common rural Africans retained some choice in matters of migration included their refusal,
despite Shepstone’s insistence, to move to “closer settlements.”27 Given that the crown would
not sufficiently fund administration of Africans in Natal, Shepstone improvised, playing one
chief off of another, and at times tolerating African disobedience, as he had no army to back up
his orders. Lambert states that “the 18th century chiefdoms had been fluid communities with an
ill-defined jurisdiction in which imizi (homesteads) had been bound together by neighborhood,
kinship (real or fictive), clientship and marriage.” He adds that chiefdom groups were fluid and
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capable of “embracing people who were prepared to adapt or manipulate their traditions of
origins…to claim kinship links…hence, membership of the chiefdom.”28 In a recent debate,
Etherington contended that precolonial Africans defined themselves as belonging to a particular
chief not as belonging to the colonial concept of a “tribe.”29
Africans migrated as circumstances dictated, as evinced by the “constant stream of
refugees into the colony from the Zulu kingdom. While many came as small groups, others were
organized and powerful chiefdoms . . . .”30 Although Shepstone attempted to restrict chiefdoms
to a defined area, Africans migrated when needed. To shore up chiefly powers, “Shepstone
recognized the right of chiefs to allocate land to their people. Within the reserve allocated to a
chief, only he could allocate the land that was held under communal tenure.”31 Hence, the ability
of the common rural African to migrate was obstructed and required khonza be paid to the new
destination chief.
Lambert acknowledges that chiefs needed to attract followers, which implies rural
Africans’ ability to migrate between chiefdoms. He asserts that hereditary chiefs drew the largest
following not only because of the resources at their command but because these chiefs “regularly
consulted with their leading abanumzana [homestead heads]. . . for the interests of their
people.”32 Such chiefs employed the sisa system that enabled wealthier men with herds of cattle
to build a patron-client relationship with poorer men “by allowing them the use of some cattle.”33
In this way chiefs were able to attract members of other chiefdoms to their fold, which evinces a
reciprocal relationship between the chief and his/her adherents remained intact. Popular consent
was still required for a chief to rule who otherwise “risked seeing people transfer their allegiance
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elsewhere.” In the colonial era, a chief’s “reputation for being a better and more just leader”
attracted followers who would migrate away from chiefs who meted out ill-treatment.34
Ultimately, Lambert concludes that the 1850s remained a time of fluidity in Natal
between chiefs and adherents, as neither settlers nor administration were secure enough to assert
authority over Africans, who ignored colonial summons. But that would soon change, as “the
colonial concept of chiefdoms as tribes” was accompanied by a “tighter territorial definition” of
boundaries of chiefdoms, where such boundaries were intended to restrict African mobility. 35 By
defining the geographical area for each chief with all Africans under that chief restricted to that
area, the colonial office intended to end voluntary rural-rural migration and containerize the
people for ease of administration. But as land was scarce, people continued to migrate as needed
for resources, and the colonial office was unable to enforce its dictums.
In addition, to tighten the territorial definition of chieftaincy, the colonial office further
obstructed the ability for common Africans to migrate when it instituted the hut tax which
burdened the already impoverished rural African. The hut tax tethered chiefs to the colonial
office by making them tax collectors, thus further poisoning the relationship between chiefs and
their subjects.36
PRECOLONIAL MIGRATION MAPS OF THE 19th CENTURY– N. ETHERINGTON
At a recent debate, Norman Etherington argued that only the institution of chieftainship has a
place in history, not “tribe,” a construction created by imperialism for its own convenience. A
frequent case of confusion was the “practice of people calling themselves by the names of the
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chief or king they followed.” While European cartographers thought in terms of “tribe, volk,
nation, Africans thought in terms of leadership wielded by genealogically conscious chiefs.”37
In Mapping Colonial Conquest, Etherington sorts the beginning of the story of how,
before its conquest of South Africa, Britain “mapped tribes” in cartography that would later
underpin the logic of separate development that fixed ethnic identities under apartheid.38 In
examining the role of early colonial cartographers in perpetuating misinformation on Africans,
Etherington cites the origins of the multiple mechanisms that would come together a century
later in the system of BA.39 Through the use of maps, Etherington delineates how colonial
powers used cartography to create social formations of identity and culture where there often
were none. He contends that the artificial colonial mapping of ethnicity was usually based on
faulty cartography that depicted tribal affiliations which “record a series of cross-cultural
misunderstandings.”40 Groups were temporary and loosely connected under an agreed upon
leader. Yet, the colonial office codified these groups under the created term “tribe” to pigeonhole
migrating Africans into a category for control and ease of native administration. (See Figure 2.
G. W. Stow, “Sketch Map of Central and Southern Africa, Showing the Main Lines of
Migration” (1880).) According to Etherington, “the most arresting features of the work are the
discreteness of the population groups depicted and their incessant movement.” Stow’s map is
ideologically loaded. Etherington argues that “His [Stow’s] primary objective . . . ‘is to prove the
great antiquity of the Bushmen in South Africa’.”41
Etherington, with his use of early maps, illustrates that precolonial Africans did not live
in discrete “homelands,” but instead migrated as needed, and that groups did not unify
permanently under one chief, but instead re-aligned their allegiance according to individual
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preferences.42 As Europeans constituted 13% of the population to Africans 87%, under
segregation and subsequently apartheid, the South African state avoided the politics of race by
dividing Africans into ethnicities under the divide and rule paradigm. In regards to the
government embarking on its “policy of fragmenting the African population,” Etherington
proves there was “some quite remarkable efforts to place tribes on maps with a precision
unknown to the sloppy cartographers of the nineteenth century.”43 Etherington cites the
cartography of N.J. van Warmelo, chief ethnologist for the Department of Native Affairs, as an
example. (See Figure 3 showing ubukhosi from van Warmelo’s map of the Zululand
chieftainships.) Etherington assesses the map: “It could hardly be bettered as an illustration of
the ethnic fragmentation promoted by apartheid ideology.”44
Of critical note, the rural Africans’ ability to migrate between chiefs provided leverage in
their dealings with traditional African leaders. By needing to gather followers, as opposed to the
colonial and apartheid states’ mandated containerization of common Africans under the concept
of a “tribe,” a precolonial chief was required to provide reciprocity, which functioned as a form
of democratic insurance for common Africans.
INSERT: Figure 2. “Sketch Map of Central and Southern Africa, showing lines of migration45
INSERT: Figure 3. Insert of a portion of van Warmelo’s map rotated and retouched by author46
THE ZULULAND LANDS DELIMITATION COMMISSION 1902-4 – A. MACKINNON
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Aran MacKinnon asked at the same forum, “What is today’s function of chieftaincy?” He
answered his own question, “Land allocation and ceremonial rites”. But before the Zululand
Lands Delimitation Commission (ZLDC), belonging, loyalty, and reciprocity were the functional
ties between the traditional ruler and his/her followers as subjects migrated and did not stay in
one place. The demarcation of reserves, with wards for each chieftainship, drastically changed
the dynamics of chieftainship and of the relationships of the chief to his people and of the people
to the land, and as a result, rural-rural migration was greatly curtailed.
With only the colonial office’s vague term of reference for the ZLDC to delimit sufficient
land making allowance for the natural increase of Zululand’s African population, the ZLDC
promulgated complete segregation of African and European land and demarcated 21 reserves for
Africans.47 Arguably, the only non-white group to benefit from the delimitation was the Dunn
progeny, to which the ZLDC allocated 10,000 acres of land in Reserve 7A of Mthunzini
(formerly Umlalazi) District.48 European settlers in Natal were eager to grow sugar cane and
pushed for the best lands on the coastal belt of the Lower Umfolosi District and the Hlabisa
District, as well as Mthunzini District, followed by the Ubombo and Ingwavuma Districts. The
Natal Ministry, pushed by white settler pressure, encouraged the ZLDC to continue to delimit
land after completing its initial task without waiting for instructions from the British imperial
government or Natal’s secretary of state. Due to complaints from Natal’s white community,
reserves were adjusted to exclude “African occupation that occurred on flat open lands” and
substituted with lands that were “broken and not so well adapted for European occupation.”49
(See Figure 4 for an example of the rolling landscape of gumtrees in former reserve 10.)
Furthermore, the commission included a wide strip of land on either side of coastal rivers for
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white occupation which prevented “Africans from expanding their grazing or settlement areas
onto lower coastal lands.”50
MacKinnon unpacks the work of the ZLDC and its impact on rural Africans, which
included restricting Africans in their regional movements and prohibiting voluntary rural-rural
migration without the consent of their chief and the colonial office. The ZLDC restricted access
to fresh ground virtually ending crop rotation and cut up ancestral lands with swaths of land for
white settlers, another cause for the loss of regional mobility for rural Africans. He argues that
“constraints imposed by the Natal government . . . undermined Africans ability to develop the
limits of traditional land occupation.”51
Additionally, the colonial office restricted Africans free use of Crown Lands outside the
reserves.52 Africans were relegated to land use and occupation on a traditional basis only, which
impacted all sectors of African society, including kholwa (Christian-educated) and exempted
Africans. The commission only informed Africans of its objective and “pointed out the delimited
reserve areas,” largely without accepting or considering any African evidence.53 Hence, when
needed, Africans voluntarily migrated to Boer farms in Zululand where they were forced to pay
not only the British hut tax but an additional rent to the white farmer. Another alternative for
voluntary rural-rural migration was crown land outside the reserves. In 1903 the Natal
government instituted a £2 squatter’s tax on Africans occupying crown lands outside the
reserves. No security of tenure was offered.54
In short, a form of voluntary rural-rural migration continued, but it was highly constricted
and expensive. Additionally, the ZLDC recommended that “all Africans remain under the
jurisdiction of their chiefs, even if they lived outside the reserves [author’s emphasis].”55 In so
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doing, MacKinnon argues that the commission diminished the power of ubukhosi “as chiefs were
unable to maintain their authority with all the district changes and land being thrown open.” 56
Along with land dispossession, other factors impacted Zulu society. The exile of Zulu
paramount chief (king) Dinizulu and a series of natural disasters put Africans in harm’s way
making Zululand vulnerable to the greed of white settlers. The 1897 rinderpest outbreak,
MacKinnon highlights, facilitated the expropriation of Zululand for white farms. C.B. Saunders,
one of two ZLDC commissioners, reported to the delimitation commission that Africans had lost
most of their cattle and would, therefore, require less land for grazing.”57
A contentious issue, states MacKinnon, was the African’s right to buy land outside the
reserves. Africans wanted to buy land for various reasons, inter alia, to secure their ancestors
graves and to protect their homes from interference. The ZLDC received numerous applications
for land from Africans to meet the needs of their expanding population. But due to the
manipulation of the Natal government, “Africans in Zululand were prohibited outright from
purchasing land either on a communal or individual basis” which put an end to this form of
voluntary rural-rural migration; a precursor to the 1913 Land Act.58 As a result, some areas in
Southern Zululand were so overcrowded that Africans migrated to the Transvaal and onto Boer
farms, despite having to pay both hut tax to the government and hut rent to the Boer farmers.
Finally, white farmers had to accept “that no more land could be thrown open . . . without
causing a serious disruption to Africans.”59 Ultimately, whites knew that they would need a
supply of local cheap black labor to work their farms. MacKinnon suggests that the ulterior
motive in these delimitations was a desire to avoid any wide scale disruption to African society
that might precipitate a rebellion.
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What had been the fluid movement of Africans in independent Zululand was
circumscribed with the demarcation of twenty-one reserves cut through with white farms that
impeded regional mobility and voluntary rural-rural migration. As depicted in Figure 3, white-
owned gumtree and sugar cane plantations break the continuity of the Mthunzini Reserves no. 9
(Mkhwanazi/ Mzimela/ Nzuza/ Zulu) and no. 10 (Mkhwanazi/ Dube). These non-contiguous
reserves would prove a serious problem for the apartheid government during consolidation of the
ethnic homelands. MacKinnon contends that few of the reserves were contiguous with one
another and this had the effect of restricting the mobility of Africans as they were isolated by
large corridors of white land.
Although advantageous conditions varied amongst districts, “by 1903, Africans were
applying to leave Umlalazi [Mthunzini District in 1907], Eshowe and Nkandla due to the lack of
available good lands and complaints of food scarcity.” 60 Despite the demarcation of reserves in
1904, these documents show that voluntary rural-rural migration was still possible, but that
Africans now needed to apply to the colonial office for permission to move from one chief to
another.
MacKinnon relates that the ZLDC sought to tie all Africans to their chiefs, as even those
outside the reserve remained under the jurisdiction of their chief. The commission felt that “to
free such people from tribal control would be fraught with dangerous consequences.” 61 Shortly
after the delimitation, European cane farmers moved into Umlalazi forcing Africans to migrate.
Chief Lokotwayo Mathaba negotiated with the magistrate and was able to forestall the removals
for a year and people were able to reap their crops.62 In the case of kholwa Africans, Saunders
was biased and directed that “Natives, when moving from one district to another are not allowed
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to sell the premises they vacate . . . .” He further stated that all kholwa Africans on open lands
were subject to traditional African authority.63 In short, Africans could voluntarily migrate but at
their own expense and they remained tied to their chief.
MacKinnon states that besides kholwa Africans, those Africans living near or on crown
land forests were subjected to restricted use of the land with the delimitation and tightened forest
regulations. If forests fell within a reserve, the commission claimed to provide “sufficient
portions of the forest to meet the requirement of the Natives.” Before delimitation and forest
regulations, MacKinnon contends, “Africans had unrestricted access to forest.”64 The ZLDC cut
off Africans ability to voluntarily migrate to crown forests and to a large extent within reserve
forests. The ZLDC cut off kholwa and exempt Africans’ ability to buy land outside the reserves
and forced ties with the local chief. The ZLDC encapsulated Africans within their chief’s ward,
requiring an application to move to another chief.
While the Anglo-Boer War saw a lessening of restrictions, once the Brits defeated the
Boers in 1902, restrictions were tightened. By 1932, according to MacKinnon, “The state . . .
ensured the chiefs were under no false assumptions about their purely consultative role in the
administration.” The Minister of Native Affairs, E.G. Jansen warned the chiefs in Natal and
Zululand that “this being a constitutional country after all, the final say rests with Europeans.” 65
MacKinnon asserts that the ZLDC made a serious effort to provide sufficient land to
Africans. Given the pressure imposed by white Natalians to allocate large tracts of land for
commercial farming, the commissioners were pushed between their desire to do right by
Africans and meeting the demands of their constituents, the white settlers. In the end, Africans
lost much land, as well as many venues for voluntary rural-rural migration across the land.
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MacKinnon concludes that Africans were “left with communal land rights in a series of
marginalized reserves.”66 This marginalization of land, he asserts, undermined the ability of
Africans “to accumulate or control capital produced on the land.”67 This author adds: the ZLDC
also undermined the ability of Africans to migrate as the need arose.
INSERT: Figure 4. Photo from the doorway at Podwane Peak . . . nearly 360 view of gumtrees
THE NATIVE ECONOMIC COMMISSION (HALLOWAY COMMISSION) 1930-1932
The main resource for understanding the state of rural-rural migration before the advent of BA is
the 1930-32 Native Economic Commission (Holloway Commission). The 9000 plus pages of the
unpublished hearings produced by this Commission were divided into fifteen subjects.68 The
fourth subject was 4. NATIVE MIGRATIONS, which included the subcategories: 4.(1) rural to
urban areas; 4.(2) inter-rural areas; and 4.(3) economic effects.
This author is particularly concerned with 4.(2) inter-rural areas migrations. Dr.
Holloway’s witnesses described 17 instances of inter-rural areas migrations for the
commission.69 One particularly salient deposition was that of van Rensburg labeled “Transfer
from tribe to tribe,” in which commission member Mr. Lucas asks, “They [Natives] are shifting
from one location to another?”70
van Rensburg: Quite a lot of them.
Lucas: Does that mean that a tribe moves from one location to another?
van Rensburg: Not a tribe, but individuals.
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Lucas: I am not sure of the position, but do they set up new tribes and then
get a location?
van Rensburg: No, they get the one tribe; you have a member living in one tribe
there transferring his allegiance from one to another, and he goes
there.
The qualitative statement “Quite a lot of them” is not reliable to provide the true scale of ongoing
rural-rural migration. Surely, the quantity of such migration was much less than in precolonial
times, and, to those government administrators, it was likely that any ongoing migration was
more migration than they viewed as desirable to occur.
Rather, the pertinent portion of van Rensburg’s testimony for this paper is “you have a
member living in one tribe there transferring his allegiance from one to another, and he goes
there.” Despite the obstacles posed by the 1904 ZLDC demarcation of reserves, rural Africans in
1930 still found a way to practice rural-rural migration when circumstances dictated.
Along with van Rensburg’s testimony and that of other resident magistrates and
amakhosi at the Native Economic Commission hearings in 1931-32, it is clear that individual
rural Africans could still practice voluntarily rural-rural migration between chiefs, so long as
they could rely on family members who already resided under the new chief to ease the process
of migration. The Bantu Authorities Act 68/1951 would finally end the ability of the common
African to voluntarily migrate between chiefs.
BANTU AUTHORITIES AND THE HARDING OF MODERN CHIEFTAINSHIP
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The author’s prior work on Bantu Authorities has shown that, under apartheid, the system of BA
completed past regimes efforts to curtail African mobility. In the establishment of a tribal
authority (TA), the commissioner codified the name of the “tribe,” codified the irregular
boundaries of the “tribe,” amalgamated and renamed “tribes” as needed into one “tribe” for ease
of department administration, and collected the names of the councilors for Pretoria’s approval
with the amount based on the number of tax-payers. All of this data was sent to the regional
office who then forwarded the application to Pretoria, the head office. When approved, the new
tribal authority was gazetted. The intense codification of tribal authorities rigidified the role of
chieftaincy and the chiefs’ relationship to their subjects, requiring rural Africans to seek
permission from the commissioner for voluntary rural-rural migration.71 The author asserts that
“Essential to separate development was a system for confining Africans to specific wards under
specific chiefs and BA was such a system.”72
By codifying Africans as members of specific tribes, the state rigidified the identity of
Africans and eliminated their personal agency in matters of migration, based on the colonizer’s
constructed identity of the other. BA specifically curtailed voluntary rural-rural migration by its:
a) coordination with the Abolition of Passes Act 67/1952; b) requisite listing of ethnicity on the
Reference Book; c) codification of an African’s homeland based on ethnicity; d) identification of
surplus Africans with the destination homeland for endorsement out of urban areas; and e)
containerization of all Africans, rural and urban, under a specific chief in a specified Bantustan.
Contrary to its name, the Abolition of Passes Act further restricted African mobility by replacing
racial limitations on mobility with tighter ethnic limitations to that same effect.
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Much like previous systems demarcated boundaries for bureaucratic control, BA
demarcated “subjects” for ease of administration and control of the indigenous people. Although
contemporary local municipality councilor elections in wards offer an avenue of democracy,
ultimately the individual inkosi does not change unless he/she is deposed or dies.
As Aninka Claassens writes, “In KwaZulu-Natal there were insufficient funds to hire the
IEC to monitor and support the elections. Yet, the IEC [Independent Electoral Commission]
ballot boxes and other equipment were used, creating the impression that the elections were
properly monitored and run by the IEC.” 73 Having attended a councilor election meeting in
reserve no. 9, which was held at the inkantolo (traditional courthouse) of the local tribal council,
in the presence of the inkosi and izinduna (headmen), the author attests to the presence of the
IEC. However, the councilors who were elected, this author noted, at the next meeting of the
traditional council were marginalized.
Rural Africans of today technically possess the right to migrate as their mobility is no
longer legally restricted. But this author has witnessed how their ability to do so is still
practically non-existent, due to poverty, unemployment, and ties to their allotment of land, if
they have one, under modern structures of traditional rule. Effectively, the only means that the
common rural African retains to affect change in the uneven power structure between subjects
and amakhosi are instituting a prolonged court case or violence.74
Today as before, land is the tool used by the government, intentionally or not, to tie rural
Africans to chiefs. This control over communal land by amakhosi has distorted traditional rule
and destabilized the relationship between chiefs and common rural Africans. But as urban
Africans have the right and ability to choose between one apartment or another, given financial
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constraints, so too should rural Africans retain the right and ability to voluntarily migrate
between amakhosi. In short, the common rural African should not be limited to residing on the
communal land held by their present inkosi. Rather, under legitimate circumstances, they must
be able to seek assistance from the government in migrating to a different rural area under a
different inkosi. If rural Africans are empowered to choose between amakhosi, this choice
inscribes a democratic component to modern chieftaincy and reinforces the bind of reciprocity
between chief and subject.
The “rural dilemma” for the state over how to administer and fund the former reserves
can be approached from two sides: democratizing chieftainship and empowering the common
rural African. The two work in tandem much like a teeter-totter. The amount of grant funding is
determined by a market economy driven by the interchange of “goods” (just rule and
appropriately applied authority) between the seller (chief) and the buyer (subject). In funding the
Africans’ ability to migrate, this market economy levels the playing field and puts chiefs in the
position of competing with other chiefs for the business and loyalty of rural Africans.
Norman Etherington argued in a recent debate that:
One of the transitions that take place over time is the relationship to chieftainship and
belonging to people, which is connected to land and land ownership. Prior to the advent
of surveying and titling of land ownership, unlike in South Africa, in other places like
West Africa, chieftaincy is not ever defined in terms of land.75
This author asserts that, in order to return to the original relationship of reciprocity between chief
and subject, the predominance of land allocation in the role of modern chieftaincy must be offset
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by formally facilitating voluntary rural-rural migration as a means of recourse for unhappy
subjects.
It is through explaining how this hardening of chieftaincy occurred in the past and its
legacy in the modern system of chieftaincy that this author’s prior work informs our
understanding of what has transpired since 1994 in regards to traditional rule. And it is through
empowering rural Africans to pursue voluntary rural-rural migration today that tradition rule may
be adjusted to mitigate the ill-effects of this legacy and return a sense of democratic agency to
the rural African people.
CONCLUSION
Debates over rural economic models, for example, modes of production and land use, have not
brought satisfactory answers on how to meet the democratic needs of rural citizens. In the past,
the colonial and apartheid regimes worked to tie roaming Africans to chiefs through bestowing
upon chiefs the powers of communal land allocation. But Europeans retained power over this
communal land by inculcating alienation, and, therefore, retained the power to control the
“native” population. Land policy was the tool by which the colonial office curtailed the
democratic aspects of chieftaincy that had made this form of traditional rule so successful in
precolonial times. Particularly, two gradual processes intertwined to freeze the common rural
African’s ability to voluntarily migrate between chiefdoms:
1) The process of co-opting chieftaincy by making chiefs subservient to the central
government, and
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2) The process of eliminating choice amongst rural subjects by curtailing migration and
tying them to reserves.
These two processes changed the original native rule into the bastardized “traditional
governance” structures of today that would actually be unrecognizable to a native inhabitant of
Zululand in the early 1700s. The author argues that the current rural poverty is seeded not only in
colonial and apartheid policies but in the lack of representation of the common rural African at
CODESA (Convention for A Democratic South Africa) as only the rural elite attended.
And although more land allocation for the rural Africans of today would surely help, it is
the strict tie that rural commoners still experience to the land and the chief that prolongs the ill
effects of decades of colonial rule. However, this author strongly feels that title deeds are not the
answer, as shifts in farming practices toward greater scale and consolidation will surely
encourage rural Africans to sell off newly acquired land to the highest bidder, local or
international.
Rather, this author posits that funding the ability of rural Africans to voluntarily migrate
between chiefs is key to the solution. To this end, the Department of Traditional Affairs (DTA)
could institute a grant application process for individual rural Africans seeking to migrate
between chiefs. The application would need to identify an eligible applicant’s level of need,
present inkosi, and preferred destination inkosi. Such a grant should provide funds to compensate
the applicant for improvements to the current land upon which they reside, to aid in the cost of
moving, and to give an economic incentive for the new inkosi to allocate land to the applicant.
Also, as popular chiefs retain more and more adherents, the government should seek to apportion
new land (where possible) to those chiefs for them to allocate amongst their growing base of
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“subjects,” thus offsetting the land-use impact of voluntary rural-rural migration. Upon offering
such incentives to the destination inkosi, chiefs would compete to offer better services, as they
would seek to grow their base of “subjects,” which would simultaneously inculcate a
democratizing element into chieftainship.
Furthermore, such funding would position rural Africans as investors in the rural
economy, as they would have the means to allocate their time, effort, and capital under the rule
of a chief who is responsive to their needs. By positioning rural Africans in such a manner, they
would have greater control over their own financial well-being, thus empowering them to
demand responsiveness of their current chief (or go elsewhere).
As Etherington contends, “Prior to the advent of surveying and titling of land ownership,
unlike in South Africa, in other places like West Africa . . . chieftaincy is not ever defined in
terms of land. It was not the land you controlled but the people who recognized you and brought
you your authority.”76 In short, the power of the common rural African to choose which chiefly
authority to recognize, through the “belonging” aspect of chieftaincy, must be reinvigorated if
conditions in the former reserves are to improve substantially.
The rural dilemma for the state can be resolved organically, if choice in migration is
returned to the people, and if the necessary funds are provided to support the practical
implications of such choice. In the past, chieftainship was most successful at serving the needs of
subjects when it was structured as a market economy, where chiefs used the means to wealth
accumulation at their disposal to compete for the allegiance of more and more subjects. The
current incarnation of chieftainship allows amakhosi to focus on personal wealth accumulation at
the expense of the common rural African. Voluntary migration is the main non-violent tool that
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history offers to curb this excess of chieftaincy and restore the incentive for “peaceful”
competition between chiefs. “One thing that has changed over the past 200 years is the
connection [of chiefs] to land and land ownership . . . then chieftainship begins to get hardened
into a system.”77
By supporting the ability of common Africans to practice voluntary rural-rural migration,
the true patterns of indigenous society can return in a manner that co-exists with the modern
form of chieftaincy that was designed to serve the interests of colonial then apartheid
governments. Funding the choice to migrate between chiefs empowers the rural commoner and
engenders competition between chiefs for support, which is the core aspect of democracy.
Many obstacles today, including the entrenched poverty of the former reserves, obstruct
the resuscitation of voluntary rural-rural migration as a practice for common rural Africans.
However, to improve the quality of life of common rural Africans, this author asserts that
voluntary rural-rural migration must be brought back as the standard means of recourse for such
Africans to democratically make their voice heard within the current system chieftainship.
Finally, this author recognizes many figures of traditional rule for their work to preserve
Zulu land, culture, and identity in the face of a system of BA that was unfairly skewed in favor
of other interests. However, this author also asserts that it is unlikely for conditions under
chieftaincy to improve until the system is adjusted to re-introduce the democratic aspect of
voluntary rural-rural migration and to provide financial support for worthy applicants. So this
author asks today’s leaders of the Zulu people to embrace this proposal with the friendly spirit
with which it is intended.
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REFERENCES
Adepoju, Aderanti. 1998. “Linkages between Internal and International Migration: The African
Situation.” International Social Science Journal 50 (157): 387–395.
Claassens, Aninka. 2010. “Analysis of recent laws and the legacy of the Bantu Authorities Act.”
5–14. In Custom, Citizenship and Rights: Community Voices on the Repeal of the Black
Authorities Act” Monica de Souza & Mazibuko Jara, eds. Law, Race and Gender
Research Unit, University of Cape Town. ISBN 978 0 7992 2466
Ehrenreich-Risner, Veronica. 2012. Interview with interim chief Mjabuliseni Dube on 25 Nov
2012 at Ongoye, KZN, South Africa.
_____. “The Effect of Apartheid’s ‘Tribal Authorities’ on Chieftaincy and the Zulu People:
Separate Development in Mtunzini District 1950-1970.” University of KwaZulu-Natal.
HAAS Seminar, February 27, 2013.
https://phambo.wiser.org.za/people/vehrenreichrisner.html
_____. 2018. “Bantu Authorities: Removals in Mthunzini District during Apartheid.” Journal of
Southern African Studies 44, 1 (2018): 115-132.
_____. Bantu Authorities: Apartheid’s System of Race and Ethnicity. Lanham, MD: Lexington
Books, 2021.
Eldredge, Elizabeth A. 2014. The Creation of the Zulu Kingdom, 1815-1828: War, Shaka, and
the Consolidation of Power. Cambridge Books EBA.
Etherington, Norman. 1976. “The Origins of ‘Indirect Rule’ in Nineteenth-Century Natal.”
Theoria: A Journal of Social and Political Theory 47 (Oct. 1976):11–21.
_____. 2007. “Putting Tribes on Maps” in Mapping Colonial Conquest: Australia and South
Africa (Crawley, WA) N. Etherington, ed., 79–101.
_____. 2007. “Writing History on Maps” in Mapping Colonial Conquest: Australia and South
Africa (Crawley, WA) N. Etherington, ed., 123–145.
Gluckman, Max. 1960. “The Rise of a Zulu Empire.” Scientific American 202, 4 (April 1960):
157–169.
Laband, John. 2018. The Eight Zulu Kings:Shaka to Goodwill Zwelithini Johannesburg: Jonathan
Ball Publishers.
Lambert, John.1995. “Chiefship in Early Colonial Natal, 1843-1879.” Journal of Southern
African Studies 21, 2 (Jun., 1995): 269–285.
MacKinnon, Aran S. 1990. “The Impact of European Land Delimitations Expropriations on
Zululand, 1880-1920.” MA thesis. University of Natal, Durban.
_____. 1990. Ch 3 in MA thesis “The Impact of European Land Delimitations and
Expropriations on Zululand, 1880-1920.” University of Natal, Durban, Department of
History, 142-173.
_____. 2001. “Chiefly Authority, Leapfrogging Headmen and the Political Economy of
Zululand, South Africa, ca. 1930-1950.” Journal of Southern African Studies 27, 3,
Special Issue for Shula Marks: 567–590.
Mamdani, Mahmood. 1996. Citizen and Subjects: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late
Colonialism. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.
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Native Economic Commission 1930-1932, Evidence and Memoranda (Holloway Commission).
University of Cape Town, Jagger Library. Herbst (Secretary of Native Affairs) Papers,
Collection Number: BC 79.
Stow, G.W. 1905. The Native Races of South Africa. G. M. Theal, ed. London.
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NOTES
1. WITS History Workshop Book Launch - Bantu Authorities: Apartheid’s System of Race
and Ethnicity, 22 June 2022.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzi05PKgw6o&list=PLgy-Io-
hbLbkR_U3DTQSEedut6v_YhScM&index=14
2. N. Etherington, “The Origins of ‘Indirect Rule’ in Nineteenth-Century Natal,” Theoria: A
Journal of Social and Political Theory, 47 (Oct. 1976): 11-21.
3. M. Mamdani, Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late
Colonialism (Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1996). See Ch 3, “Indirect Rule: The
Politics of Decentralized Despotism.”
4. A. Adepoju, 1998. “Linkages between Internal and International Migration: The African
Situation,” International Social Science Journal, 50, 157 (Sep 98): 387-395, 387.
5. J. Laband, The Eight Zulu Kings: Shaka to Goodwill Zwelithini (Johannesburg, Jonathan
Ball Publishers, 2018).
6. N. Etherington, “Putting Tribes on Maps,” in Mapping Colonial Conquest: Australia and
South Africa (Crawley, WA: University of Western Australia Press, 2007). N.
Etherington, ed., 79-101, 91. Etherington is Emeritus Professor of History at the
University of Western Australia. He has written widely on the history of Southern Africa,
the British Empire and European Imperialism. He is a Fellow of the Academy of the
Social Sciences in Australia, the Royal Historical Society (UK), the Royal Geographical
Society (UK) and a past president of the Australian Historical Society. In 2014 he was
made a Member of the Order of Australia for service to history and the community.
7. Laband, The Eight Zulu Kings, 29.
8. A. S. MacKinnon, “The Impact of European Land Delimitations” MA thesis for
University of Natal, Durban, 1990. Additionally, without getting into the mfecane debate,
scholars accept that groups did migrate to Natal to avoid Shaka’s wars.
9. To establish a new TA required the district commissioner to submit, for Pretoria’s
approval, the name of the chief, the councilors, and the ward boundaries, before gazetting
the new TA. In the process, the Department’s surveyors generally demarcated new
boundaries for the chief’s ward.
10. Interview with interim chief Mjabuliseni Dube on 25 Nov 2012 at Ongoye, KZN, South
Africa. When Dube was a child his people had use of their side of the nearby lake. When
Europeans wanted the full use of the lake, his people were pushed south and no longer
had access to the sea ending a fishing/mollusk economy in addition to agricultural.
During apartheid the land where a great portion of the Dube people lived was
expropriated for the new township to serve Richards Bay labor, eSikhawini, causing
overcrowding in reserve no. 10 that spilled over into the Mkhwanzi ward of no. 10.
11. M. Gluckman, “The Rise of a Zulu Empire,” Scientific American 202, No. 4 (April
1960): 157-69.
12. Ibid., 160.
13. Ibid.
14. Ibid., 158.
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15. Ibid., 158-161.
16. Ibid., 158.
17. Ibid., 162.
18. Cited in E.A. Eldredge, The Creation of the Zulu Kingdom, 1815-1828: War, Shaka, and
the Consolidation of Power (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2014).
19. Gluckman, “The Rise”, 161.
20. J. Lambert, “Chiefship in Early Colonial Natal, 1843-1879,” Journal of Southern African
Studies 21, 2 (Jun., 1995): 269-85.
21. Ibid, 278.
22. WITS History Workshop Book Launch - Bantu Authorities. N. Etherington, panelist
23. Lambert, “Chiefship in Early Colonial Natal,” 270-272.
24. Ibid., 272.
25. Ibid., 272. Lambert cites: South African Archival Records, Natal No. 5, Records of the
Natal Executive Council (Cape Town, 1964), Lieutenant-Governor to Secretary of State,
30 December 1858, 263-264.
26. Lambert, “Chiefship in Early Colonial Natal,” 271.
27. Ibid., 272.
28. Ibid., 273.
29. WITS History Workshop Book Launch - Bantu Authorities. N. Etherington, panelist.
30. Lambert, “Chiefship in Early Colonial Natal,” 274.
31. Ibid.
32. Ibid., 277.
33. Ibid.
34. Ibid.
35. Ibid., 278.
36. Ibid., 279-80.
37. Etherington, “Putting Tribes on Maps” in Mapping Colonial Conquest, 79-101, 91.
38. Ibid., 88, 94-96.
39. V. Ehrenreich-Risner, Bantu Authorities: Apartheid’s System of Race and Ethnicity.
(Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2021), 50-3.
40. Etherington, “Putting Tribes on Maps” in Mapping, 88.
41. N. Etherington, “Writing History on Maps” in Mapping Colonial Conquest, 127.
42. Ehrenreich-Risner, Bantu Authorities, 2021, 180.
43. Etherington, “Putting Tribes on Maps” in Mapping, 94.
44. Ibid.
45. Map cited in Etherington “Writing History on Maps” in Mapping, 126, 142.
46. Ehrenreich-Risner, Bantu Authorities: Apartheid’s System of Race and Ethnicity, 2021,
26, 74-82. N. J. van Warmelo, A Prelimary Survey of the Bantu Tribe of South Africa
(Pretoria, Government Printer, 1935). Union of South Africa, Department of Native
Affairs, Ethnological Publication, Vol. V. Cited in N. Etherington, “Putting Tribes on
Maps” in Mapping Colonial Conquest, 94-95.
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47. A. S. MacKinnon, Ch 3 MA thesis, “The Impact of European Land Delimitations and
Expropriations on Zululand, 1880-1920,” University of Natal, Durban, Department of
History, 1990, 142, 154.
48. For a discussion of the removals of the non-Dunn Zulu from Reserve 7A, see V.
Ehrenreich, Bantu Authorities, 2021, Ch 4, 179-202. Also see Ehrenreich-Risner, 2018.
49. MacKinnon, Ch 3, “The Impact of European Land Delimitations and Expropriations on
Zululand, 1880-1920,” 148.
50. Ibid., 149.
51. Ibid., 142.
52. Ibid., 165.
53. Ibid., 142, 148.
54. Ibid., 156.
55. Ibid. The commission believed that “to free such people from all tribal control would be
fraught with dangerous consequences.”
56. Ibid., 156.
57. Cited in MacKinnon, “The Impact of European Land Delimitations,” 143. Colonial
Office, Colony of Natal, original correspondence (C.O. 179) Vol 212/21864, confidential,
7 June 1900, Saunders Report.
58. Ibid., 150.
59. Ibid., 152.
60. Ibid., 155. Umlalazi District was changed to Mthunzini District by Proclamation 16 of
1907 due to the confusion in names with Umlazi township in Durban.
61. MacKinnon, “The Impact of European Land Delimitations,” 156. Zululand Lands
Delimitation Commission (ZLDC), 46.
62. MacKinnon, “The Impact of European Land Delimitations,” Ch 3, 157-8.
63. Ibid., 162.
64. Ibid., 162-3.
65. A. S. MacKinnon (2001). “Chiefly Authority, Leapfrogging Headmen and the Political
Economy of Zululand, South Africa, ca. 1930-1950.” Journal of Southern African Studies
27, 3, Special Issue for Shula Marks: 567-590, 574.
66. Ibid., 165.
67. Ibid., 167.
68. Native Economic Commission 1930-1932, evidence and memoranda (Holloway
Commission). University of Cape Town, Jagger Library, Herbst (Secretary of Native
Affairs) Papers, Collection Number: BC 79 E1.
69. Ibid., A1.2.4, 4.
70. Ibid., 377.
71. Ehrenreich-Risner, Bantu Authorities, 2021, 8-9.
72. Ibid.
73. Aninka Claassens "Analysis of Recent Laws and the Legacy of the Bantu Authorities
Act" 5-17, 7. in Custom, Citizenship and Rights: Community Voices on the Repeal of the
Black Authorities Act. July 2010 Monica de Souza & Mazibuko Jara, eds. ISBN 978 0
Empowering Common Africans and Democratizing Chieftaincy: Voluntary Rural-Rural Migration
Veronica Ehrenreich-Risner, PhD 35 of 35 July 31, 2022
7992 2466 Law, Race and Gender Research Unit, University of Cape Town, Cape Town,
SA.
74. KwaZulu-Natal Rural Women’s Movement has won a landmark judgment, against the
Ingonyama Trust. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wH6R0dWWZE0
75. WITS History Workshop Book Lauch: Bantu Authorities, Etherington quote.
76. Ibid., Etherington quote.
77. Ibid., Etherington quote.
