Ciskei
Ciskei (/səsˈkaɪ, sɪs-, -ˈkeɪ/ səss-KY, siss-, -KAY, meaning on this side of [the river] Kei), officially the Republic of Ciskei (Xhosa: iRiphabliki yeCiskei), was a Bantustan for the Xhosa people, located in the southeast of South Africa. It covered an area of 7,700 square kilometres (3,000 sq mi), almost entirely surrounded by what was then the Cape Province, and possessed a small coastline along the shore of the Indian Ocean.
Republic of Ciskei iRiphabliki yeCiskei | |||||||||
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| 1981–1994 | |||||||||
Coat of arms
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| Motto: "Siyakunqandwa Ziinkwenkwezi" (Xhosa) "We Shall be Stopped by the Stars" or "The Sky is the Limit" | |||||||||
| Anthem: Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika Xhosa: God Bless Africa | |||||||||
Location of Ciskei (red) within South Africa (yellow) | |||||||||
| Status | Bantustan (de facto; independence not internationally recognised) | ||||||||
| Capital | Bisho | ||||||||
| Official languages | Xhosa English | ||||||||
| Leader | |||||||||
• 1972–1973 | Chief J. T. Mabandla | ||||||||
• 1973–1978a | Lennox Leslie Wongamu Sebe | ||||||||
• 1978–1990b | Lennox Leslie Wongamu Sebe | ||||||||
• 1990–1994 | Brigadier General Oupa Gqozo | ||||||||
| History | |||||||||
• Self-government | 1 August 1972 | ||||||||
• Nominal independence | 4 December 1981 | ||||||||
| 4 March 1990 | |||||||||
• Foiled coup d'etat | 10 February 1991 | ||||||||
• Re-integrated into South Africa | 27 April 1994 | ||||||||
| Area | |||||||||
| 1980 | 9,000 km2 (3,500 sq mi) | ||||||||
| Population | |||||||||
• 1980 | 677,920 | ||||||||
| Currency | South African rand | ||||||||
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Under South Africa's policy of apartheid, land was set aside for black peoples in self-governing territories. Ciskei was designated as one of two homelands, or "Bantustans", for Xhosa-speaking people.
Xhosa people were forcibly resettled in the Ciskei and Transkei, the other Xhosa homeland.
In contrast to the Transkei, which was largely contiguous and deeply rural, and governed by hereditary chiefs, the area that became the Ciskei had initially been made up of a patchwork of "reserves", interspersed with pockets of white-owned farms. In Ciskei, there were elected headmen and a relatively educated working-class populace, but there was a tendency of the region's black residents—who often worked in East London, Queenstown, and King Williams Town—to oppose traditional methods of control. These differences have been posited as the reason for two separate homelands for the Xhosa people being developed, as well as the later nominal independence of Ciskei from South Africa, than Transkei.
After its creation, large numbers of blacks, in particular, "non-productive Bantus"—women with dependent children, the elderly, and the infirm—were expelled by the apartheid government from designated white areas in the Cape Province to Ciskei, and it was also treated as a reservoir of cheap black labour. The diaspora of the Ciskei Xhosa was due to the settler colonialism and internal wars between the Xhosa.
Ciskei had a succession of capitals during its existence. Originally, Zwelitsha served as the capital, with the view that Alice would become the long-term national capital. However, it was Bisho (now spelled Bhisho) that became the capital until Ciskei's reintegration into South Africa.