District Six is here again
|Published
REBORN: Zonnebloem now District 6 REBORN: Zonnebloem now District 6
Zonnebloem is officially dead and District Six has been reborn and renamed.
Sports, Arts and Culture Minister Nathi Mthethwa on Tuesday announced that the geographical name of the suburb Zonnebloem will now be District Six and it has been Gazetted.
Earlier this year, a campaign was launched by the District Six Museum to change Zonnebloem back to Die Ses.
Thousands of residents were removed from the area more than five decades ago after the apartheid-era Group Areas Act declared the area whites-only.
Residents and the descendants of those who have since died applied to the SA National Geographical Names Council in 2018 for the name to be restored.
The City of Cape Town has also renamed Keizersgracht Road to its historic name Hanover Street in September.
ROOTS: Keizersgracht Road renamed Hanover Street in September.
Shahied Ajam, chairman of the District Six Working Committee (D6WC), says: “We are ecstatic that this has come at a very opportune moment. We wish to thank the heritage consultants, the District Six Museum, the Western Cape Department of Arts and
Culture for their hard work here. Thank you very much.”
Meanwhile, the claims of former residents and their descendants have received a massive boost after Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development Minister Thoko Didiza submitted a “detailed plan” on the redevelopment of District Six to the land claims court on Tuesday.
Didiza submitted the plan for claims lodged between 1994 and 1998.
The department was taken to court by the D6WC and ordered to submit a “conceptual layout” detailing redevelopment for the area.
Didiza inherited the project with the new administration and was granted an extension by the court to familiarise herself with the matter.
She said on Tuesday that her department had submitted the conceptual layout, details on how the plan was to be funded, timeframes for implementation and the methodology to be applied in allocating the residential units to the claimants, in line with the court’s orders.
OFFICIAL: Minister Nathi Mthethwa’s announcement. File photo
Didiza met with the D6WC and interested parties on Saturday to discuss the plan.
“In addition, quarterly reports are to be submitted to court disclosing progress on the re-development plan,” said her department.
Phase three of the re-development is currently underway, and is set to be comple-
ted in 2020.
There are 954 claimants, some of whom may still opt for financial compensation.
According to Ajam, if all goes well, the last of the remaining claimants in District Six could move into their new homes within three years.