EC helps Griqua get services

In view of traditional leaders' rejection of the Demarcation Board's new municipal boundaries, Daily Dispatch reporter MKHULULI TITI spoke to the head of African languages at the University of Fort Hare, Dr Ntalenyane Lesoetsa, about the history of the boundary disputes.

A COMMITMENT made by the Eastern Cape and the KwaZulu-Natal provincial governments to improve delivery of services in the East Griqualand region seemed to have managed to solve the previous tensions between the two provinces.

Eastern Cape Premier Makhenkesi Stofile and his then counterpart, Dr Ben Ngubane, agreed in 1997 not to tamper with the present boundaries.

After a series of meetings between the two provinces on August 27, 1998, it was finally agreed that co-operation should be enhanced to ensure delivery of services to all people in the affected areas. Some communities in the areas in question wanted to be part of the Eastern Cape, while others wanted to move over to KwaZulu-Natal.

On August 1998, talks were held between the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal governments to ensure service delivery to the people of the East Griqualand.

It was announced in that meeting that the formalisation of co-operation would ensure that the people in the affected boundary areas between the two provinces were not inconvenienced by the controversial boundaries, which had yet to be resolved.

The discussion focused on social needs of the people of the bordering towns, including co-operation on education, health and welfare, and mechanisms were developed to promote co-operation between various departments of the two provinces.

According to the head of African languages at the University of Fort Hare, Dr Ntalenyane Lesoetsa, the name East Griqualand originates from the name Griqua and the area itself was named after the Griquas who were descendants of Adam Kok.

He said the Griquas originally lived in the northern parts of the Cape around the Kimberly area and came from the west to the east, crossing the Drakensberg through Matatiele to the district now called Kokstad.

The British referred to the whole region as "no-man's land" and Adam Kok was encouraged to stay there by the Cape government.

The area was under Faku in the 1860s. The wars which raged in the Trans-Orania and other places forced the people to cross the Drakensberg and settle in the "no-man's-land".

Umzimkulu River was the boundary until the Afrikaners decided to carve the country into a bantustan.

In April 1997, the Trengrove Commission of Inquiry recommended that East Griqualand be incorporated into the Eastern Cape, but the recommendations were never implemented.

Reacting to the commission's recommendations, Ben Ngubane stated that East Griqualand would never be incorporated into the Eastern Cape -- "not now nor in future".

While Matatiele, Cedarville, Franklin and Kokstad remained part of Natal, the villages around these towns became part of Transkei.

Although Umzimkulu is nearer to Natal, it is part of Transkei while Kokstad is part of Natal, Lesoetsa said.

He said people of the affected areas should be given a chance to decide whether they wanted to be part of the Eastern Cape or KwaZulu-Natal.

He said the whole of Kokstad and Matatiele districts should be part of the Eastern Cape as it would be easier to draw a boundary like that.

The chairman of the Demarcation Board, Michael Sutcliffe, said they had decided that the East Griqualand area should be a cross-boundary municipal area.

"We have asked the premiers of the two provinces and national Local Government Minister Sidney Mufamadi to discuss the issue, and we hope they will be able to find a solution soon," Sutcliffe said.