District Six, Cape Town in

Armed with bulldozers they came to do a job nothing more just hired Idllers. 

One of the first acts of the new post-apartheid government was to change the name of the district back to Sophiatown, but the district still remains a largely White 

There have also been some deliberate efforts to alter some of the spatial frameworks of apartheid era so that greater social development could occur. At the macro level this meant eliminating the Bantustan structures and introducing new provincial units, with an increased decentralization of power to that level (see Fig. 107.1). The post-apartheid constitution ceded many financial and social functions to the provincial level representing devolution of power that was needed because some of the provincial divisions do have a strong ethnic element to them. 

Similar to other organs of the post-apartheid government structure, the national names committee has moved a significant amount of power to the provincial level, and even to the municipal level where street name changes can be recommended. The final decision is a ministerial one, done within the context of the framework of African Renaissance , a concept presented by then Vice President Thabo Mbeki and one that emphasizes African cultural renewal. 

The debate over changing cultural landscape features such as prominent place names was to be expected in post-colonial societies such as Burma and India, but in colonial-settler societies such as South Africa, Namibia, and Zimbabwe, these proposals have often caused their own political turmoil. When it was first suggested 

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Fig. 107.5 District Six, Cape Town in 2009. (Photo by Dugald Cloete)...

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