Talk:Pretoria

Pretoria doesn't have a mayor - infobox

Someone should remove the name of the mayor from the infobox, because Pretoria doesn't have a mayor of its own. The local (municipal) government of Pretoria, along with sourrounding towns is now part of the City of Tshwane Metropolitan Municpality. However, Pretoria still exists as a place and as the capital of South Africa, it simply doesn't have a seperate municipal government.

To explain the point, again, Pretoria is a city. Tshwane is the name of the much larger metropolitan municipality that contains Pretoria, as well as other nearby towns. Therefore although Pretoria continues to exist, it doesn't have a seperate municipal government, and, hence it doesn't have a mayor of its own. This situation exists throughout South Africa, with many once independent cities and towns, although still existing, no longer have seperate municipal governments, instead being part of Metropolitan Councils or similar structures.

See also these links [1] [2]that illustrate the relationship between Pretoria and Tshwane. 168.209.98.35 20:59, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

Also, seperate anniversary celebrations were held for Pretoria in 2005, and Tshwane in 2006 [3] underscoring that the difference between the two names, as of January 2006. 168.209.98.35 20:40, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Pretoria/Tshwane

Apparently, the city of Pretoria, or a metropolitan area that includes it, is now officially called Tshwane. See also List of cities in South Africa. This needs to be mentioned in this article. Nyh 07:50, 17 May 2004 (UTC)

It's still officially called "Pretoria" from what I can tell. According to the BBC [4], the South African Geographic Names Council will meet in October 2005 to consider the name change. --Delirium 12:52, Mar 8, 2005 (UTC)

Hmm, the name change is mentioned twice now (Intro and History); perhaps one should be removed? Dewet 06:14, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Yes, Pretoria is still the official name. Only the central government has the power to change place names (or to name new places, for that matter), on the advice of the South African Geographic Names Council. You can probably imagine what chaos there would be if local governments could decide on this themselves. On the other hand, if one follows the (flawed, IMHO) logic that was used to argument for keeping the spelling "Spion Kop" in Battle of Spion Kop, Wikipedia should only change the Pretoria article name to Tshwane (or merge & redirect) once the Google-count of the latter has surpassed the former. Elf-friend 08:09, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Aye Aye --Jcw69 09:56, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps internet users connect different meanings to Pretoria and Tshwane (e.g. the former being a subset of the latter), in which case the Google-count is meaningless. It's less confusing just to follow SAGNC. -- Nroets 22:44, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Even though the GNC has approved it, they have not necessarily recommended it, and it will stay Pretoria until Arts and Culture Minister Pallo Jordan approves it. See this News24 article for his comments.

It is now officially called Tshwane. The article should be changed

I'm willing to believe that the name change has become official, but we need a reliable source before we can change the article. The author of the previous paragraph didn't even sign his or her name. Gwil 18:49, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

The name change IS NOT official as of January 2006. There is still a long and laborious process ahead should the name change go ahead. Currently the name awaits Arts and Culture Minister Pallo Jordans approval. It will then be published in the Government Gazette, giving the public 3 months to respond to the proposal. The minister then takes the matter back to the Geographic Name Place Council before presenting it to Parliament. Should Parliament vote to go through with the change the decision can, and probably will, be challenged by various interest groups in the country, keeping it tied up in legal battles for some time to come. As of 14 January 2006 there is no geographic area named Tshwane registered in the national names database, nor have there been any announcements by the ministers office on what is to be done. The official capital of South Africa is still Pretoria. 198.54.202.234

---

I'd love to see some discussion of the history of the song "Marching To Pretoria" made famous (for us old-timers) by the Weavers

--- Treat this comment as biased etc, and if somebody could confirm a few things: As far as I understand it there is absolutely legitimate purpose in the Tshwane Metropolitan Councils decission. Numerous settlements both in South Africa and internationally are either a part of or are served by a different entity. The matter in South Africa is the cause of some dispute but essentially the Municipal Council took a decision to rename an entity simply because that entity is within its area of municipal jurisdiction - something that is very easy to drag to absolute absurdities because it would suggest that the Makana Municipality could rename Rhodes University or that the Joburg Metropol could rename companies. However absolute absurdities aside the bottom line is that Pretoria as a name exists in several contexts and I can not see the Tshwane Metropol actually possesing the neccessary authority to make many of the required changes for example:

• There is a High Court seated in Pretoria, now while there is uncertainty as to its name the fact remains that a Local Government entity should not be permitted to instruct a judicial institution to adopt a name change.
• There is a diocese of Pretoria for both the Anglican Church (the CPSA) and the Roman Catholic Church (actually IIRC an ArchDisocese and an Apostolic Nuncio), now while changes can be made again I believe that it would be suitable for the President of South Africa (as Head of State) to consult (even if only by proxy) with the Pope and the Arch Bishop of Cape Town before such a change is made.
• The same applies with regard to foriegn countries who maintain consular representatives in the Tshwane Metropolitan area (predominanenty in the "township" of Arcadia)
• The area that makes up the CBD of Pretoria is probably registered in the Deeds registry as the township of Pretoria - again this can be changed but it isn't for the council to randomly do.

My submission is of course that Municipalities have (as I believe most entities do) the power to change there own name and a case of the Joburg Metropolitan Council deciding to change its name to Poepsonderwaterville an entirely different matter would emerge.

In any event I believe a proper construction of what local government is in South Africa needs to be made and it would be good if SALGA were to actually build a wiki containing an outline of each municipality as well as the settlements inside that municipalities area of jurisdiction (there would therefore be an entity for Kouga, Cacadu and Jeffrey's Bay all of which would have links to each other and only two of which would be "government" entities)

--- There is no point do discuss whether the oficial name of pretoria is T or P, this is very well documented and stated at these pages. Point is what the city is called. And as more and more webpages, written texsts, companies and people use the name Tswhane, I find it directly biased and unscientific not to put that straight at the beinning of this text. it does not need to stand as a Pretoria/Tswhane, but if Tswhane is put into brackets, or as my idea is, to call it "PRetoria, also called Tswhane" there is no doubt of what is the propper name of the city. THere is no need to put politics into that!!

I have recently been in contact with the South African Dept of Arts and Culture. Their public affairs rep provided me with all the information used to make my recent edit, to the effect that Pretoria remains the offical name until approved by the Minister of Arts and Culture. Additionally, the public affairs rep also provided me with a general statement dealing with past/current/future name changes in the RSA. If anyone would like a copy, feel free to contact me here. Mike Beidler 16:43, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

The economy of Pretoria

I wouldn't be surprized if services contribute much more to the economy of Pretoria than manufacturing, incl. heavy industries. It has 3 major universities, and many banks, lawfirms, accounting firms and IT companies have major operations in the city.

Demographics

Are there any more specific facts about Pretorias demographics, or does this issue also get cloudet with the tswane municipality-thing? I have seen links to statistics at the cape-town jhb pages, but they pint to the greater municipality, (wich naturaly does not have a name controversy)

Diplomatic missions

I have removed the unsubstantiated claim that Pretoria has the second largest number of embassies in the world behind Washington DC. I am maintaining the Diplomatic missions by country lists and I can think of many other cities (Brussels, Paris, London, Rome, Beijing etc.) that would attract more embassies. Kransky 13:12, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Largest residential university in the country

I did a quick Google and found the following link for citation:

[5] [6]

If someone feels it is enough evidence please modify the page or I will try to get more citations. Openhazel 13:22, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Capital Status

Pretoria is a city located in the northern part of Gauteng Province, South Africa. It is one of the country's three capital cities, serving as the executive (administrative) and official de facto capital; the other two being Cape Town and Bloemfontein, respectively the legislative and judicial capitals.

I think this is incorrect in three material respects: 1) official de facto is problematic if its official it isn't de facto it just is. 2) de facto South Africa does not have a single integrated central capital historically there are three cities enjoying capital status, the final Constitution mentions one (Cape Town) but if we look at the list o institutions that are important four cities are de facto seats of Government - the traditional 3 and Johannesburg. If any thing: Pretoria is a city located in the northern part of Gauteng Province, South Africa. It is on the country's three historic capital city holding the designation of executive (administrative) capital; the other two being Cape Town and Bloemfontein, respectively the legislative and judicial capitals. Pretoria can be regarded as the Seat of Government and primary capital city owing to the number of governance institutions housed in the city (in contrast to Cape Town housing Parliament and Bloemfontein the Supreme Court of Appeal) and the fact that the Constitutional Court is based in Johannesburg effectively giving it the same claim to capitalhood as Cape Town and Bloemfontein.

Could probably be said with more weight.

3) The City of Tshwane is being marketed as the capital this is a bigger metropolitan area that exceeds Pretoria the remark is awaiting confussion in that department.

Paul Hjul 14:56, 26 January 2007 (UTC)