OR Tambo International airport is one of hundreds of South African place names that have been officially changed since 2000.
The airport’s new name and a bust of Tambo are due to be unveiled on Friday by President Thabo Mbeki.
The South African Geographical Names Council (SAGNC) lists 833 new names approved since 2000, including at least 145 names that were completely changed. The others are names with corrections to spellings, and names for previously unnamed places.
The SAGNC is responsible for decisions on place names nationally. Local authorities have jurisdiction over names in their municipal areas, such as street and suburb names, so those are not included in the list.
The new names included 28 dams, seven nature reserves, 14 hills, mountains or peaks, four forests, two beaches, 405 post offices, four police stations, 13 railway stations, 67 rivers, 53 towns and 216 villages, townships or settlements.
The changed names include: OR Tambo International airport replacing Johannesburg International airport, Mashishing (formerly Lydenburg), eMalahleni (Witbank), KwaDukuza (Stanger), Sol Plaatje Dam (Saulspoort Dam), Dullah Omar interchange (EB Cloete), Makhado (Louis Trichardt), Modimolle (Nylstroom), Mokopane (Potgietersrus) and Polokwane (Pietersburg).
The Blyde River in Mpumalanga was changed to the Motlatse River in November 2003; the rest of the same river in Limpopo had to wait another two years to catch up to the change.
Blood River (named after a battle) is now Mulaudzi River.
Politically embarrassing names have been changed. Places like Mpumalanga’s Kaffirskraalkopie, Kaffirskraal and Boesmanspruit have been replaced by eNdlulamithini, Ezimbuthumeni and Waterfall respectively. In the Western Cape, Hotnotsdrif changed to Grootfonteindrif.
Corrected spellings include the updated Bhisho instead of Bisho and Mthatha instead of Umtata.
New places include Constitution Hill in Johannesburg, the seat of the Constitutional Court, and a range of previously unnamed geographical features on Marion Island off the Western Cape.
Limpopo is the most enthusiastic about naming with 267 new names, followed by North West with 111, Mpumalanga with 89, the Eastern Cape with 54, Gauteng and the Western Cape with 25 each, KwaZulu-Natal with 42, the Northern Cape with eight and the Free State with just five. The provinces for the remaining 205 names are not identified.
Applications to change a place name may be made to the SAGNC. The council meets three times a year to decide on names. — Sapa