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All 46 seats in the Assembly (lower house) 24 seats are needed for a majority All 15 seats in the Council (upper house) 8 seats are needed for a majority | ||
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![]() Provinces and electoral districts. |
The first election for the Parliament of the Cape of Good Hope was held in 1854. There were no clear party lines, however many representatives for Eastern electoral districts subscribed to a common programme which emphasised separation from the Cape Colony or moving the seat of colonial government eastward, a vagrancy law, or increasing the property qualification part of the franchise (which would have reduced the number of non-Whites able to vote). [1]
The election was conducted on the basis of the multi-racial Cape Qualified Franchise: Cape residents qualified as voters based on a universal minimum level of property ownership, regardless of race.
Elections to the upper house, the Cape Legislative Council, were conducted under a cumulative voting electoral system. This gave each voter several votes, which they could give to a single candidate, or split amongst several. This was justified by the Report from a Committee of the Board of Trade and Plantations on the basis that it would prevent any single group gaining a monopoly on power, as a minority voting in unison could ensure the return of their preferred candidate. The Cape Colony White population at the time was majority Boer, with British settlers forming a minority. The British Government had pushed for the franchise property qualification to be low, thereby extending the franchise to the non-white population, who it was believed were more likely to side with the British than the Boers. [2]
The population for the colony was estimated at 225,000 in 1853, with coloureds outnumbering whites by a ratio of 55:45. The ratio of registered voters however was heavily in favour of whites. [1]
For elections to the House of Assembly, the Cape was divided into 22 electoral divisions, returning a total of 46 members. The electoral division boundaries corresponded with the existing Cape Colony fiscal divisions. The only exceptions to this were for Albany, and the urban areas of Cape Town-Green Point and Grahamstown, (which were not included in the Cape electoral division), which had their own electoral divisions. [3]
The Province of the Cape of Good Hope, commonly referred to as the Cape Province and colloquially as The Cape, was a province in the Union of South Africa and subsequently the Republic of South Africa. It encompassed the old Cape Colony, as well as Walvis Bay, and had Cape Town as its capital. In 1994, the Cape Province was divided into the new Eastern Cape, Northern Cape and Western Cape provinces, along with part of the North West.
Andrew Geddes Bain, was a South African geologist, road engineer, palaeontologist and explorer.
Uitenhage, officially renamed Kariega, is a South African town in the Eastern Cape Province. It is well known for the Volkswagen factory located there, which is the biggest car factory on the African continent. Along with the city of Port Elizabeth and the small town of Despatch, it forms the Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipality.
Graaff-Reinet is a town in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. It is the oldest town in the province and the sixth-oldest town in South Africa, after Cape Town, Stellenbosch, Simon's Town, Paarl and Swellendam. The town was the centre of a short-lived republic in the late 18th century. The town was a starting point for Great Trek groups led by Gerrit Maritz and Piet Retief and furnished large numbers of the Voortrekkers in 1835–1842.
The following lists events that happened during the 1790s in South Africa.
Aberdeen is a small town in the Sarah Baartman District Municipality of the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. With its numerous examples of Victorian architecture, it is one of the architectural conservation areas of the Karoo.
Jacobus Nicolaas Boshof was a South African (Boer) statesman, a late-arriving member of the Voortrekker movement, and the second state president of the Orange Free State, in office from 1855 to 1859.
The magistrates' courts are the lowest level of the court system in South Africa. They are the courts of first instance for most criminal cases except for the most serious crimes, and for civil cases where the value of the claim is below a fixed monetary limit.
Sir Andries Stockenström, 1st Baronet, was lieutenant governor of British Kaffraria from 13 September 1836 to 9 August 1838.
Colonel John Graham was a British soldier and administrator best known for founding the settlement of Grahamstown in the Cape Colony in 1812. Grahamstown went on to become a military, administrative, judicial and educational centre for its surrounding region.
Johann Fran(t)z Drège, commonly referred to by his standard botanical author abbreviation Drège, was a German horticulturalist, botanical collector and explorer of Huguenot descent.
Jansenville is a town in Sarah Baartman District Municipality in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa.
Justice Andries Stockenström, second son of Sir Andries Stockenström, was an influential judge in the Cape Colony. He was appointed Attorney-General of the Cape in 1877, but died soon after his appointment at the age of 36.
The Parliament of the Cape of Good Hope functioned as the legislature of the Cape Colony, from its founding in 1853, until the creation of the Union of South Africa in 1910, when it was dissolved and the Parliament of South Africa was established. It consisted of the House of Assembly and the legislative council.
People of the Karoo refers to notable individuals who come from, or whose lives have included substantial engagement with, the area known as the Karoo. The Karoo is a widespread physiographic province in the western interior of South Africa, straddling much of the Northern Cape, southern Free State, Eastern Cape interior and parts of the Western Cape Provinces.
John Burnet Biddulph was a Cape Colony explorer and trader who arrived with the 1820 Settlers.
In South Africa, as elsewhere in the world, the railways played a huge part in development and growth on nearly all terrains in the country. Conversely, events in South Africa and its neighbours over the years had a huge influence on the development of railways.