Native Urban Areas Act

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The Native Urban Areas Act , Act No. 21/1923 (German as: "natives residential area Law") came in 1923 in South Africa into force and fixed the right of residence of the black rural population in urban areas. Amendment laws to this in 1930 and 1937 and another law, the Native Service Contract Act of 1932, led to a comprehensive registration of commuting workers from the rural settlement areas (reservations) designated for blacks before the apartheid period .

Effects

This law determined the number of people who were allowed to stay in the city and thereby severely restricted the rights of black South Africans in the cities.

For a legal stay in the cities, every black male South African had to register with the administration upon arrival in the municipality, present his contract of service and pay a fee of no more than 2 shillings per month for his stay. Each of these persons received an official document at their own request. If the work activity ended, for example due to the end of the contract, imprisonment or other circumstances, each of these persons had to leave the location after a specified period. Excluded from these regulations were those from among the blacks who held declarations of exemption from this duty, registered parliamentarians in the Cape Colony, landowners, chiefs, headmens and some teachers, clergymen and interpreters.

Since around 1925, a discussion has developed at the political and administrative level of the South African Union as to whether tax collection should not be linked to a binding personal document. After the Natives (Urban Areas) Consolidation Act of 1945 came into force, the rules of residence were tightened during the Smuts government due to political pressure from Boer nationalist politicians with their ideological metaphor of the swart gevaar (“black danger”). So-called prescribed areas were now defined as clearly geographically delimited zones for which the necessary residence permits had to be applied for.

The Native Urban Areas Act of 1923 provided options for a controlled business license and tried to prevent the acquisition of land by black buyers in urban areas. Instead, it directed these private endeavors to specific designated reserves .

General development

In the practice of this law, a development of separate regional and municipal administrative structures was set in motion, upon which the later legislative implementation of apartheid policy could be built. In the Native Local Areas one was Superintendent with an Advisory Board ( Advisory Board used). This advisory board was composed of former police employees and white people with administrative experience. It was not until 1961 that these advisory councils were replaced by the Bantu Councils ( Urban Bantu Councils Act No 79/1961 ), whose circle was now determined by an electoral process and made up exclusively of black people.

The Native Urban Areas Act was an attempt by the South African government to limit the urbanization of the black population. This was intended to prevent the black population from displacing the Boers, impoverished by the Boer War, on the labor market. In addition, it was feared that city life with all its “temptations” ( alcohol , prostitution, etc.) could spoil the character of blacks and prevent them from working for whites.

The Native Urban Areas Act of 1923 was further tightened with the Native Laws Amendment Act (No. 54/1952) in 1952 , but these laws could not restrict the urbanization of the black population in the metropolitan areas in the long term, given the many townships .

Passport requirement

A reference book as a general personal document with the obligation to carry it with you was only available for black men from 1958 as a result of the Natives (Abolition of Passes and Coordination of Documents) Act ( Act No. 67/1952 ) and for black women only from 1963. If they did not have this document with them, they could be called to account with a 50 rand (after 1961) fine or up to three months in prison. This is often confused with the Native Urban Areas Act . However, the passport laws provided grounds for demonstrations and other protests over a long period and ultimately contributed to the Sharpeville massacre .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Ellison Kahn: The Pass Laws . In: Ellen Hellmann (Ed.), Leah Abrahams: Handbook on Race Relations in South Africa . Cape Town, London New York, 1949. pp. 283–284 (see Ellison Kahn ( memento of the original from October 13, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link accordingly Instructions and then remove this notice. ) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / whoswho.co.za
  2. a b Christoph Sodemann: The laws of apartheid . Bonn 1986, pp. 30-32