Khayelitsha was established in 1985 and large numbers of people were forcefully relocated there, mostly peacefully but occasionally with violence. Īs the black population grew, the apartheid regime sought to solve the 'problem' by establishing new black neighbourhoods. The Witdoeke were actively supported by the apartheid government in its fight against the ANC-aligned UDF, which had actively opposed plans for people to be moved to the new township of Khayelitsha. In 19, conditions in squatter camps like Crossroads and KTC worsened and exacerbated by official policing policy in which homes were destroyed and the emergence of the Witdoeke, led by 'Mayor' Johnson Ngxobongwana. By then, many black people had already illegally settled in townships like Nyanga and Crossroads. After the scrapping of pass laws in 1987 many black people, mainly Xhosas, moved into areas around Cape Town in search of work. The discrimination and black population control by the apartheid government did not prevent black people from settling in the outskirts of Cape Town. Khayelitsha was one of the apartheid regime's final attempts to enforce the Group Areas Act and was seen as the solution to two problems: the rapidly-growing number of migrants from the Eastern Cape and overcrowding in other Cape Town townships. By 1985, the suburb Site C had 30,000 people.

Plans to build Khayelitsha were first announced by Dr Piet Koornhof in 1983, then Minister of Co-operation and Development.

When Cape Town finally started implementing the Group Areas Act, it did so more severely than any other major city by the mid-1980s, it had become one of the most segregated cities in South Africa. It is reputed to be one of the largest and fastest-growing townships in South Africa.Ĭape Town initially opposed implementing the Group Areas Act passed in 1950, and residential areas in the city remained unsegregated until the first Group Areas were declared in the city in 1957. ə ˈ l iː tʃ ə/) is a township in Western Cape, South Africa, on the Cape Flats in the City of Cape Town Metropolitan Municipality.

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