Bojanala Region Rustenberg

The Sotho-Tswana speaking peoples adhere to totems, which are honoured emblems of the tribe.

The totem is revered by the members of that tribe and is often chosen to commemorate an event of great importance in tribal history.

The baFokeng are originally BaKwena people and they still honour the crocodile (Kwena) as their totem.

THE BAFOKENG PEOPLE OF RUSTENBURG

Battling for The Rights of the People to Land & Resources

Origins

The baFokeng are originally BaKwena people. It is thought that the baFokeng people originated in central Africa, from whence they migrated southwards over more than a millennium. The baFokeng are a branch of the Sotho-Tswana peoples who eventually settled throughout southern Africa. According to oral tradition, the baFokeng came upon an area that boded well for agriculture and animal husbandry. As the valleys amongst the hills in the area captured heavy overnight dew, the people realised it would be a fertile land and the community would prosper. So they decided to settle there and, in honour of the occasion, to take the name 'baFokeng,' literally meaning 'people of the dew'. This was added to 'Kwena' (Crocodile), the genealogical totem of the Sotho-Tswana peoples.

When they arrived in the area as baKwena people, they found that the valleys amongst the hills captured heavy overnight dew. It would be a fertile land and the tribe would prosper. So they decided to settle there and, in honour of the occasion, to take the totem: baFokeng: 'the people of the dew'. This was then added to the name baKwena so that the genealogical totem was maintained.

Years of War

The baFokeng through the ages had a turbulent history. The tribal history is thought to begin in the early 1700s under King Sekete III. The baFokeng were oppressed by the baHurutse, who castrated the baFokeng's bulls as an insult to the baFokeng. This led to war which the baFokeng won.

Next were the Zulus under Mzilikazi who, fleeing westwards from King Chaka, attacked everyone who got in their way and devastated the area. The baFokeng were almost destroyed. The Boers eventually drove out Mzilikazi.

Life Under the Boers

The Boers posed new challenges to the baFokeng. Ownership of land now meant purchase, and purchase meant money. The Boers were recruiting baFokeng to work their farms, but only in return for food, clothing and accommodation.

The then recently discovered diamond mines in Kimberley provided the answer and Chief Mokgatle of the baFokeng sent his young men to work there. They went on foot (a considerable journey) and worked on contract for six months to a year. At the end they returned home and paid their earnings into the tribal 'kitty'. This provided some of the capital to legally buy back their lands.

Buying Back Their Land

With the help of the missionaries who were active in the area and the efforts of Chief Mokgatle to build good relations with the missionaries, the ancestral lands of the baFokeng were bought back. Little did they know what treasures lay hidden under the surface!

Unknown to the baFokeng until 1925, was the fact that the farms bought both by the tribe and individuals were located on the Merensky Reef. This outcrop is rich in an alphabet of minerals ranging from asbestos to vanadium, the most important of which is platinum. Mining companies may utilise the underground rights of the land, (on a 'use it or loose it' basis) but the surface rights belong to the baFokeng. The mines have to pay royalties to the tribe and provide job opportunities.

This made the baFokeng the richest tribe in Africa.

The Royal Bafokeng Nation of Today

The Bafokeng nation currently (2003) spans 44 farms and extends over 70 000 hectares. The kingdom is sub-divided into 72 traditional dikgoro (wards), each of which is regulated by a hereditary dikgosana (headman) and mmadikgosana (headman’s wife).

Located on the mineral-rich Merensky Reef, the Bafokeng kingdom has an abundance of chrome reserves and the world's second-largest platinum deposits.

An agreement reached between several mining companies and the Royal Bafokeng administration resulted in the Bafokeng receiving compensation payments and annual royalties from the mining companies that extract minerals from the land.

In 1999 the late Kgosi Lebone Mollwane Molotlegi II won a 10-year legal battle for royalty payments from Impala Platinum Holdings (Implats) - amounting to an estimated R827-million at the end of the 2002 financial year - which began mining platinum on Bafokeng soil in the 1960s.

Royalties were raised to 22% from 1998, and the Bafokeng were given one million Implats shares, worth about R250-million today, and a seat on Implats' board, which is currently occupied by the new king, Kgosi Leruo Molotlegi.

The Bafokeng have formed Royal Bafokeng Resources Holdings (RBR) to manage the mining-related interests of the nation - including its 43.9% shareholding in SA Chrome and Alloys, the only ferrochrome producer listed on the JSE Securities Exchange.

The Bafokeng have used their income from mining to build schools, roads, clinics and other infrastructure such as a sports complex incorporating a soccer stadium with an athletics track, an Olympic-size swimming pool, tennis courts, basketball courts and a gymnasium. Almost all the infrastructure has been planned, designed and funded by the Royal Bafokeng.

The Bafokeng Nation Installs a new king - August 2003

Kgosi (King) Leruo Molotlegi was enthroned in August 2003 as the 36th paramount ruler of the 800-year-old kingdom.

The ceremony was attended by high-profile local and international dignitaries as well as members of the 300 000-strong nation at the Royal Bafokeng Stadium in Phokeng, near Rustenburg.

The third of six children, Kgosi Molotlegi's ascendance to the kingship is by birth and the Bafokeng laws of succession.

The Bafokeng king has devised Vision 2020, a programme which aims to foster sustainable development for the Bafokeng through the effective use of resources.

The king has said he will strive, as part of the vision, to move the Bafokeng mindset away from work-seeking employees to job-creating employers, and to transform heir economy from a resource-based into a knowledge-based one.

Kgosi Leruo is a member of the Mineral Rights Association of Indigenous People of South Africa, and holds a degree in architecture and urban planning from the University of Natal.

Mmemogolo (Mother of the Nation) Semane B Molotlegi, is the Queen Mother of the Bafokeng nation.

THE PROVINCE