Sipho Ngwenya was the first democratically elected mayor of the Greater city of

Durban Durban ( ; , from meaning "bay, lagoon") is the third-most populous city in South Africa, after Johannesburg and Cape Town, and the largest city in the Provinces of South Africa, province of KwaZulu-Natal. Situated on the east coast of South ...

. He was the first black mayor of the city in the post-

apartheid Apartheid ( , especially South African English: , ; , ) was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. It was characterised by an ...

era of South Africa. Durban, South Africa's third largest city, saw a number of name changes, from Greater City of Durban to Durban UniCity, before the current and final, eThekwini Metropolitan Municipality. Sipho Ngwenya was a member of the

Inkatha Freedom Party The Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP; ) is a conservative political party in South Africa, which is a part of the current South African Third Cabinet of Cyril Ramaphosa, government of national unity together with the African National Congress (ANC). A ...

(IFP) when he was elected as mayor. He was the first citizen of Durban for two years of the first five-year democratic term. During South Africa's first democratic elections of 1994, the province of

KwaZulu-Natal KwaZulu-Natal (, also referred to as KZN) is a Provinces of South Africa, province of South Africa that was created in 1994 when the government merged the Zulu people, Zulu bantustan of KwaZulu ("Place of the Zulu" in Zulu language, Zulu) and ...

was won by the Inkatha Freedom Party. In 1996, the Greater City of Durban was restructured to form the Durban UniCity, where an

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) 1994 mayoral candidate, Obed Mlaba, was then appointed the mayor. In the year 2003, a constitutional amendment by the South African parliament called floor crossing was passed. Sipho Ngwenya was one of the first high-profile politicians who utilized this bill and crossed from the Inkatha Freedom Party to the African National Congress.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ngwenya, Sipho Year of birth missing (living people) Living people African National Congress politicians Inkatha Freedom Party politicians Mayors of Durban