Marikana, formerly known as Rooikoppies, is a town in the

Rustenburg Rustenburg (; , Afrikaans and Dutch: ''City of Rest'') is a city at the foot of the Magaliesberg mountain range. Rustenburg is the most populous city in North West province, South Africa (549,575 in 2011 and 626,522 in the 2016 census). In 2017 ...

local municipality,

Bojanala Platinum District Municipality Bojanala Platinum is one of the 4 districts of North West province of South Africa. The seat of Bojanala Platinum is Rustenburg. The majority of its 1,507,505 people speak Setswana (2011 Census). The district code is DC37. Geography Neighbours ...

district in the

North West The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each sepa ...

province of

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

. The name Rooikoppies means 'red hills' in Afrikaans. Neighbouring localities include Marikana train station (1 km; 0.62 mi to the north-east), Wonderkop (4 km; 2.5 mi), Ramala, Rietfontein,

(29 km; 18 mi); Swaershoek (30 km; 19 mi);

Mooinooi Mooinooi is a platinum and palladium mining town in the North West province of South Africa, roughly halfway between Brits and Rustenburg. Formerly a boomtown A boomtown is a community that undergoes sudden and rapid population and economi ...

(31 km; 19 mi); Brits (36 km; 22 mi);

Monakato Monakato is a town in the North West province of South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South A ...

(38 km; 24 mi);

Hartbeespoort Hartbeespoort, informally also known as "Harties", is a small resort town in the North West Province of South Africa, situated on slopes of the Magaliesberg mountain and the banks of the Hartbeespoort Dam. The name of the town means "gateway of th ...

(43 km; 27 mi); Kosmos (48 km; 30 mi).

History

The town was laid out in 1870 on the farm Rooikoppes, and the settlement later expanded into seven white-owned farms. In 1933, the

Buffelspoort Dam Buffelspoort Dam is an arch type dam in the Sterkstroom River, a tributary of the Crocodile River (West), North West Province, South Africa. Its main purpose is for irrigation use and it is owned by the Department of Water Affairs. It is locat ...

was built, allowing the local farmers to irrigate their crops. The farming community grew in the 1960s on the back of lucrative tobacco farming, but other diversified farming practices i.e.

cattle Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, cloven-hooved, herbivores. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus ''Bos''. Adult females are referred to as cows and adult mal ...

maize Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 10,000 years ago. Th ...

chillies Chili peppers (also chile, chile pepper, chilli pepper, or chilli), from Nahuatl '' chīlli'' (), are varieties of the berry-fruit of plants from the genus ''Capsicum'', which are members of the nightshade family Solanaceae, cultivated for t ...

paprika Paprika ( US , ; UK , ) is a spice made from dried and ground red peppers. It is traditionally made from ''Capsicum annuum'' varietals in the Longum group, which also includes chili peppers, but the peppers used for paprika tend to be milder an ...

, soya, lusern and

sunflower The common sunflower (''Helianthus annuus'') is a large annual forb of the genus ''Helianthus'' grown as a crop for its edible oily seeds. Apart from cooking oil production, it is also used as livestock forage (as a meal or a silage plant), as ...

amongst the main groups was the main economic driver of the area. In the 1970s mining was introduced and grew to become the main industry in the region. The main mining activities are PGMs and chrome. Since the introduction of mining activities, the informal and formal population had a growth explosion. The

Marikana massacre The Marikana massacre was the killing of thirty-four miners by the South African Police Service (SAPS) on 16 August 2012 during a six-week wildcat strike at the Lonmin platinum mine at Marikana near Rustenburg in South Africa's North West prov ...

of 10 August 2012 and the subsequent killing of 34 workers by police made headlines in the international media.

References

Populated places in the Rustenburg Local Municipality Populated places established in 1870 1870 establishments in the South African Republic {{NorthWestZA-geo-stub