Inkwanca Local Municipality was a local municipality that forms part of the

Chris Hani District Municipality The Chris Hani District Municipality () is a landlocked district municipality situated in the centre of the Eastern Cape province of South Africa and is made up of eight local municipalities. Most of the communities are in rural areas. The land ...

in 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 ...

. Inkwanca is an

isiXhosa Xhosa ( , ), formerly spelled ''Xosa'' and also known by its local name ''isiXhosa'', is a Bantu language, indigenous to Southern Africa and one of the official languages of South Africa and Zimbabwe. Xhosa is spoken as a first language ...

name meaning cold. The municipal area is the coldest area in the country and the lowest temperatures are recorded in the area every year. After

municipal elections In many parts of the world, local elections take place to select office-holders in local government, such as mayors and councillors. Elections to positions within a city or town are often known as "municipal elections". Their form and conduct var ...

on 3 August 2016 it was merged into the larger

Enoch Mgijima Local Municipality Enoch Mgijima Municipality () is a local municipality within the Chris Hani District Municipality, in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. It was established after the August 2016 local elections by merging the Tsolwana, Inkwanca, and Lu ...

Geography

The municipality covers an area of in the Stormberg Mountains, approximately northwest of

East London East London is the part of London, England, east of the ancient City of London and north of the River Thames as it begins to widen. East London developed as London Docklands, London's docklands and the primary industrial centre. The expansion of ...

. It abuts on the Gariep Local Municipality to the north, the Maletswai Local Municipality to the northeast, the Emalahleni Local Municipality to the east, the Lukhanji Local Municipality to the southeast and the Tsolwana Local Municipality to the southwest. The population of the municipality according to the 2011 census was 21,971 people in 6,228 households. 89.1% of residents described themselves as "

Black African Black is a racial classification of people, usually a Politics, political and Human skin color, skin color-based category for specific populations with a mid- to dark brown complexion. Not all people considered "black" have dark skin and ofte ...

", 6.2% as "

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

" and 4.1% as "

Coloured Coloureds () are multiracial people in South Africa, Namibia and, to a smaller extent, Zimbabwe and Zambia. Their ancestry descends from the interracial mixing that occurred between Europeans, Africans and Asians. Interracial mixing in South ...

". 85.8% speak

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 ...

as their

first language A first language (L1), native language, native tongue, or mother tongue is the first language a person has been exposed to from birth or within the critical period hypothesis, critical period. In some countries, the term ''native language'' ...

, 8.3% speak

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 ...

and 3.5% speak English. The two towns in the municipality are

Molteno Molteno (; ) is a (municipality) and a hill-top town in the Province of Lecco in the Italian region Lombardy, located about northeast of Milan and about southwest of Lecco. As of 31 December 2004, it had a population of 3,206 and an area of .Al ...

(pop. 11,553) and Sterkstroom (pop. 7,165).

Politics

The municipal council consisted of seven members elected by

mixed-member proportional representation Mixed-member proportional representation (MMP or MMPR) is a type of representation provided by some mixed electoral system, mixed electoral systems which combine local Winner-take-all system, winner-take-all elections with a Compensation (el ...

. Four councillors were elected by

first-past-the-post voting First-past-the-post (FPTP)—also called choose-one, first-preference plurality (FPP), or simply plurality—is a single-winner voting rule. Voters mark one candidate as their favorite, or first-preference, and the candidate with more first- ...

in four wards, while the remaining three were chosen from

party list An electoral list is a grouping of candidates for election, usually found in proportional or mixed electoral systems, but also in some plurality electoral systems. An electoral list can be registered by a political party (a party list) or can c ...

s so that the total number of party representatives was proportional to the number of votes received.

2011 election

In the election of 18 May 2011 the

African National Congress The African National Congress (ANC) is a political party in South Africa. It originated as a liberation movement known for its opposition to apartheid and has governed the country since 1994, when the 1994 South African general election, fir ...

(ANC) won a majority of five seats on the council. The following table shows the results of the election.

2014 election

On 11 September 2014 the Inkwanca municipal council was dissolved, and new elections were held on 26 November. The

(ANC) again won a majority of five seats on the council. The following table shows the results of the election.

References

External links

Official website
{{coord, 31.3950, S, 26.3622, E, source:wikidata-and-enwiki-cat-tree_region:ZA, display=title Former local municipalities of South Africa Enoch Mgijima Local Municipality