The Sarah Baartman District Municipality (; ), formerly the Cacadu District Municipality, is situated in the western part of the

Eastern Cape The Eastern Cape ( ; ) is one of the nine provinces of South Africa. Its capital is Bhisho, and its largest city is Gqeberha (Port Elizabeth). Due to its climate and nineteenth-century towns, it is a common location for tourists. It is also kno ...

province of

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

, covering an area of 58,242 square kilometres. The area of the district municipality includes seven local municipalities. The seat is the city of

Gqeberha Gqeberha ( , ), formerly named Port Elizabeth, and colloquially referred to as P.E., is a major seaport and the most populous city in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. It is the seat of the Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipa ...

, although Gqeberha is not itself in the district (it is in the

Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipality The Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality (; ) is one of eight metropolitan municipalities in South Africa. It is located on the shores of Algoa Bay in the Eastern Cape province and comprises the city of Gqeberha, the nearby towns of Uitenhage and De ...

). As of 2011, the languages most spoken among the 388,201 inhabitants were

Xhosa Xhosa may refer to: * Xhosa people, a nation, and ethnic group, who live in south-central and southeasterly region of South Africa * Xhosa language, one of the 11 official languages of South Africa, principally spoken by the Xhosa people See als ...

and

Afrikaans Afrikaans is a West Germanic languages, West Germanic language spoken in South Africa, Namibia and to a lesser extent Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe and also Argentina where there is a group in Sarmiento, Chubut, Sarmiento that speaks the Pat ...

. The district code is DC10. The municipality is a multi-ethnic administration, formed through the merging of the predominantly Afrikaans-speaking western part of the Eastern Cape, together with Xhosa areas near the Fish River, and the English district of Albany (with its own distinctive local culture, dating back to the

1820 settlers The 1820 Settlers were several groups of British colonists from England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, settled by the government of the United Kingdom and the Cape Colony authorities in the Eastern Cape of South Africa in 1820. Origins After th ...

). The name ''Cacadu'' is regarded by the

as covering the entire area of the district municipality, but in fact it is taken from a river that runs entirely in Gqeberha. ''Cacadu'', meaning "bulrush water", is the Xhosa form of the

Khoekhoe Khoikhoi ( /ˈkɔɪkɔɪ/ ''KOY-koy'') (or Khoekhoe in Namibian orthography) are the traditionally nomadic pastoralist indigenous population of South Africa. They are often grouped with the hunter-gatherer San (literally "foragers") peop ...

name of the river. The Dutch name is a translation: ''Papenkuils'' (in Afrikaans a bulrush is called a ''papkuil''). The river rises in the Parsons Vlei and runs to the sea close to the Gqeberha industrial suburb of Deal Party. In 2015, the municipality was renamed for Saartjie "Sarah" Baartman (1789–1815), a

woman who was taken to

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

to perform at

freak show A freak show is an exhibition of biological rarities, referred to in popular culture as "Freak, freaks of nature". Typical features would be physically unusual Human#Anatomy and physiology, humans, such as those uncommonly large or small, t ...

s and after her death her remains were exhibited until 1974. The renaming is part of an effort to redress marginalisation of the Khoekhoe people.

Government

The Executive Mayor of Sarah Baartman District Municipality is Deon De Vos, and the Municipal Manager is Unathi Daniels.

Geography

The Sarah Baartman district covers an area of in the southwestern part of the

province. It extends to the

Great Fish River The Great Fish River (called ''great'' to distinguish it from the Namibian Fish River) () is a river running through the South African province of the Eastern Cape. The coastal area between Port Elizabeth and the Fish River mouth is known as ...

in the east and the

Sneeuberge The Sneeuberge or Sneeuberg mountain range was historically known as “Sneeuwbergen”, meaning ‘snow mountains’ in Cape Dutch, and refers to a significant portion of Southern Africa's Great Escarpment in the Cradock, Murraysburg, Rich ...

in the north. The metropolitan area around

is excluded from the district, being in the

. The southwestern part of the district (west of Gqeberha) is marked by several ranges of mountains that run parallel to the sea, including the

Baviaanskloof Baviaanskloof Mega Reserve is a protected area in the Eastern Cape Province, South Africa. Characteristics The Baviaanskloof (Dutch for "Valley of Baboons") lies between the Baviaanskloof and Kouga mountain ranges. The easternmost point of th ...

mountains, the

Kouga mountains The Kouga mountains are a mountain range on the border of the Eastern Cape and Western Cape provinces in South Africa, stretching in an east–west direction. They are part of the Cape Fold Belt, beginning just east of Uniondale and stretching fu ...

and the

Tsitsikamma mountains The Tsitsikamma mountains form an east-west mountain range located in the Garden Route region of the southern South African coast in the Western Cape and Eastern Cape provinces. Tsitsikamma means 'place of much water' in the Khoekhoe language. ...

. In the southeastern part (east of Port Elizabeth) is the Albany region around the city of

Grahamstown Makhanda, formerly known as Grahamstown, is a town of about 75,000 people in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. It is situated about northeast of Gqeberha and southwest of East London. It is the largest town in the Makana Local Mun ...

. The northern interior of the district is the southeastern end of the

Karoo The Karoo ( ; from the Afrikaans borrowing of the South Khoekhoe Khoemana (also known as !Orakobab or Korana) word is a semidesert natural region of South Africa. No exact definition of what constitutes the Karoo is available, so its extent is ...

. To the west the district borders on the

Garden Route The Garden Route (Afrikaans: ''Tuinroete'') is a stretch of the south-eastern coast of South Africa which extends from Witsand in the Western Cape to the border of Tsitsikamma Storms River in the Eastern Cape. The name comes from the verdant ...

and Central Karoo districts of the

Western Cape The Western Cape ( ; , ) is a provinces of South Africa, province of South Africa, situated on the south-western coast of the country. It is the List of South African provinces by area, fourth largest of the nine provinces with an area of , an ...

; to the north it borders on the Pixley ka Seme district of the

Northern Cape The Northern Cape ( ; ; ) is the largest and most sparsely populated Provinces of South Africa, province of South Africa. It was created in 1994 when the Cape Province was split up. Its capital is Kimberley, South Africa, Kimberley. It includes ...

; and to the east it borders on the

Chris Hani Chris Hani (28 June 194210 April 1993; born Martin Thembisile Hani ) was a South African military commander, politician and revolutionary who served as the leader of the South African Communist Party (SACP) and chief of staff of uMkhonto we S ...

and Amathole districts of the Eastern Cape. Sarah Baartman district is divided into nine local municipalities, as below: After the municipal elections on 3 August 2016, the Camdeboo, Ikwezi and Baviaans municipalities were merged to form the new

Dr Beyers Naudé Local Municipality Dr Beyers Naudé Municipality (; ) is a local municipality within the Sarah Baartman District Municipality, in the Eastern Cape of South Africa. The municipality was established by merging the Camdeboo, Ikwezi and Baviaans local municipalitie ...

, with its head offices in Graaff-Reinet. This merger resulted in there being seven local municipalities within the Sarah Baartman District.

Demographics

The following statistics are from the 2001 census.

Gender

Ethnic group

Age

Politics

Election results

Election results for Cacadu in the

South African general election, 2004 General elections were held in South Africa on Wednesday, 14 April 2004. The African National Congress (ANC) of President Thabo Mbeki, which came to power after the end of the apartheid system in 1994, was re-elected with an increased majority. ...

. * Population 18 and over: 252,570 5.06% of total population* Total votes: 161,399 1.58% of total population* Voting % estimate: 63.90% votes as a % of population 18 and over

References

External links

Sarah Baartman District Municipality Official Website
{{Municipalities of the Eastern Cape District municipalities of the Eastern Cape Karoo