Ramatlabama (or Ramatlhabama) is a village and railway station north of Mafikeng, in the

North West The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each sepa ...

province of

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

. It is located on the border with

Botswana Botswana (, ), officially the Republic of Botswana ( tn, Lefatshe la Botswana, label= Setswana, ), is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 percent of its territory being the Kalaha ...

, and serves as a

border post A border checkpoint is a location on an international border where travelers or goods are inspected and allowed (or denied) passage through. Authorization often is required to enter a country through its borders. Access-controlled borders ofte ...

for road and rail traffic. At the time of the 2011 census, Ramatlabama along with the adjoining settlement of Miga had a total population of 2,046.

Transport

Ramatlabama is the southern end of Botswana's A1 highway and the northern end of South Africa's N18. It is also the location where the

Cape Town Cape Town ( af, Kaapstad; , xh, iKapa) is one of South Africa's three capital cities, serving as the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. It is the legislative capital of the country, the oldest city in the country, and the second largest ...

–

Bulawayo Bulawayo (, ; Ndebele: ''Bulawayo'') is the second largest city in Zimbabwe, and the largest city in the country's Matabeleland region. The city's population is disputed; the 2022 census listed it at 665,940, while the Bulawayo City Council ...

railway line enters Botswana; north of Ramatlabama the railway is the main line of

Botswana Railways Botswana Railways (BR) is the national railway of Botswana. History Botswana Railways (BR) was established in 1987 when the government of Botswana bought out the Botswana-based sections of the National Railways of Zimbabwe (NRZ). NRZ had bee ...

, while to the south it is part of the network of

Transnet Freight Rail Transnet Freight Rail is a South African rail transport company, formerly known as Spoornet. It was part of the South African Railways and Harbours Administration, a state-controlled organisation that employed hundreds of thousands of people ...

References

Populated places in the Mafikeng Local Municipality Botswana–South Africa border crossings {{NorthWestZA-geo-stub