Pretoria - The Department of Sports, Arts and Culture will today play host in its Limpopo leg of the geographical names capacity-building workshop at The Ranch hotel near Polokwane.
Politicians, mayors, municipal officials, councillors and community members are expected take part in the awareness event that is meant to educate individuals about the process of name changing.
The South African Geographical Names Council was established in terms of the South African Geographical Names Council Act as the body responsible for standardising geographical names, according to department spokesperson Zimasa Velaphi.
Speaking to Pretoria News yesterday, she said the programme’s aim was to capacitate municipal managers in naming and renaming “buildings, places and geographic places” in the context of facilitating the promotion of a common national identity, social cohesion and national healing.
“This process was initiated in 1994 as an integral part of the overall transformation of the South African heritage landscape.
“The standardisation of geographical names seeks to rectify the historical perspective of geographical names, correct spelling mistakes, eradicate the geographical names duplication, and affirm the history as well as identity of the province.”
She said the workshop, which began in KwaZulu-Natal last year, was also an awareness creation and education drive for all South Africans, meant to reach audiences across the country.
“Our political principals must know how the name-changing process works and who is in involved. There is a need to educate the nation on this process as they think that once a suggestion is made then we as a department effects those changes,” Velaphi said.
Asked if there were plans to effect name changes in future, Velaphi said: “The government will change names as long as there are requests from the different areas as part of our transformation of the heritage landscape.
“If there are any cities to be changed, the Geographical Name Change Council in the province moves the process forward.”
Recently, the City of Joburg agreed to have one of the main roads in the city, William Nicol Drive, changed to Struggle icon Winnie Mandela Drive.
In February last year, Minister of Sports, Arts and Culture Nathi Mthethwa announced a number of name changes in the Eastern Cape, saying these were for transformation purposes.
Port Elizabeth changed to Gqeberha, Uitenhage to Kariega, King Williams Town to Qonce, East London Airport to King Phalo Airport, and Port Elizabeth Airport to Chief Dawid Stuurman International Airport.
Pretoria News