The Malay Camp in

Kimberley Kimberly or Kimberley may refer to: Places and historical events Australia Queensland * Kimberley, Queensland, a coastal locality in the Shire of Douglas South Australia * County of Kimberley, a cadastral unit in South Australia Ta ...

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

, was a cosmopolitan suburb which was subject to forced removals prior to the

Group Areas Act Group Areas Act was the title of three acts of the Parliament of South Africa enacted under the apartheid government of South Africa. The acts assigned racial groups to different residential and business sections in urban areas in a syste ...

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History

Malay Camp had a history similar to Cape Town's

District Six District Six (Afrikaans: ''Distrik Ses'') is a residential neighborhood in Cape Town, South Africa, located next to the city's Cape Town CBD, CBD. In 1959, people of color were banned from the area and most of them were resettled in Gugulet ...

, Johannesburg's

Sophiatown Sophiatown , also known as Sof'town or Kofifi, is a suburb of Johannesburg, South Africa. Sophiatown was a poor multi-racial area and a black cultural hub that was destroyed under apartheid. It produced some of South Africa's most famous writ ...

and Port Elizabeth's South End. It was a cosmopolitan suburb originating in the early days of Kimberley's existence but subject to forced

slum clearance Slum clearance, slum eviction or slum removal is an urban renewal strategy used to transform low-income settlements with poor reputation into another type of development or housing. This has long been a strategy for redeveloping urban communities; ...

after the owner of the land ( De Beers Consolidated Mines Ltd) donated the area to the Kimberley Municipality in 1939. Most of the houses, churches, mosques, shops and other buildings were demolished, making way for Kimberley's Civic Centre. This occurred from the 1940s, prior to the better known

Apartheid Apartheid ( , especially South African English: , ; , ) was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. It was characterised by an ...

forced removals consequent on the

, making Kimberley's Malay Camp clearance unique.

Prominent residents

Solomon T. Plaatje, noted author, journalist and first General Secretary of the African Native National Congress, was a resident of Malay Camp. His later dwelling at 32 Angel Street is preserved as the Sol Plaatje Museum.

Malay Camp History Projects

* Moosa Aysen's booklets on ''Islam on the Diamond Fields''. * Historical Society of Kimberley and the Northern Cape, 1998 - to collect social and living history. *

McGregor Museum The McGregor Museum in Kimberley, South Africa, originally known as the Alexander McGregor Memorial Museum, is a multidisciplinary museum which serves Kimberley and the Northern Cape, established in 1907. Overview Housed at first in a purp ...

Malay Camp Exhibition, 2002 * Louis Mallett Malay Camp Social History Project, 2003 * Liz Crossley Project ''The Past is not Dead'', 2004 * Permanent display at the

, 2006,

References

Explanatory notes Citations Sources * * * * *

External links

Liz Crossley: The Past is not Dead Project
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