District Six

District Six (Afrikaans: Distrik Ses) is a residential neighborhood in Cape Town, South Africa, located next to the city's CBD. In 1959, people of color were banned from the area and most of them were resettled in Gugulethu. In the following years, District Six was then declared a whites-only area and most of the residents were resettled in the Cape Flats. Over the course of a decade, over 60,000 of its inhabitants were forcibly removed and in 1970 the area was renamed Zonnebloem, a name that makes reference to an 18th-century colonial farm. At the time of the proclamation, 56% of the district's property was White-owned, 29% Black-owned, 26% Coloured-owned and 18% Indian-owned. The vision of a new white neighbourhood was not realised and the land has mostly remained barren and unoccupied. The original area of District Six is now partly divided between the suburbs of Walmer Estate, Zonnebloem, and Lower Vrede, while the rest is generally undeveloped land.

On 17 December 2019, the Arts and Culture minister, Nathi Mthethwa, gazetted the renaming of Zonnebloem to District Six after the District Six Museum launched a campaign earlier that year to have the old name brought back and some residents applied to the South African Geographical Names Council in 2018 for the same.

The area was named in 1966 as the Sixth Municipal District of Cape Town. The area began to grow after the freeing of the enslaved in 1833. The District Six neighbourhood is bounded by Sir Lowry Road on the north, Buitenkant Street to the west, Philip Kgosana Drive on the south and Mountain Road to the East. By the turn of the century it was already a lively community made up of former slaves, artisans, merchants and other immigrants, as well as many Malay people brought to South Africa by the Dutch East India Company during its administration of the Cape Colony. It was home to almost a tenth of the city of Cape Town's population, which numbered over 1,700–1,900 families.

Among the multi-ethnic community, there were thousands of Jewish residents from the 1880s to their departure in the mid-1940s and 1950s. Newly arrived Jewish migrants first settled in the area in significant numbers where they maintained their traditions from Eastern Europe such as conversing in Yiddish and frequenting Yiddish theatre. They were originally part of the working class of the community and established their own schools, stores, and community centres in the area. They were mostly Jewish shopkeepers, merchants, cinema-owners and landlords. In 1934, the Hyman Liberman Institute opened as a community centre and library in District Six in memory of Cape Town's first Jewish mayor, Hyman Liberman. It was based on the model of Toynbee Hall in London and was partnered with the University of Cape Town. It became the centre of "high culture" in the district. As the socioeconomic situation of District Six Jews improved, they began to move to more affluent ″whites-only″ suburbs such as Gardens, Oranjezicht, Higgovale and Vredehoek. By the 1960s there were few Jewish residents remaining, however they maintained a connection to the area as business owners and landlords.

After World War II, during the earlier part of the Apartheid Era, District Six was relatively cosmopolitan. Situated within sight of the docks, its residents were largely classified as coloured under the Population Registration Act, 1950 and included a substantial number of coloured Muslims, called Cape Malays. There were also a number of black Xhosa residents and a smaller number of Afrikaners, English-speaking whites, and Indians.^{[citation needed]}

In the 1960/70s large slum areas were demolished as part of the apartheid movement which the Cape Town municipality at the time had written into law by way of the Group Areas Act (1950). This however did not come into enforcement until 1966 when District Six was declared a 'whites only' area, the year demolition began. New buildings soon arose from the ashes of the demolished homes and apartments.

Government officials gave four primary reasons for the removals. In accordance with apartheid philosophy, it stated that interracial interaction bred conflict, necessitating the separation of the races. They deemed District Six a slum, fit only for clearance, not rehabilitation. They also portrayed the area as crime-ridden and dangerous; they claimed that the district was a vice den, full of immoral activities like gambling, drinking, and prostitution. Though these were the official reasons, most residents believed that the government sought the land because of its proximity to the city centre, Table Mountain, and the harbour.^{[citation needed]}

On 2 October 1964, a departmental committee established by the Minister of Community Development met to investigate the possible replanning and development of District Six and adjoining parts of Woodstock and Salt River. In June 1965, the Minister announced a 10-year scheme for the re-planning and development of District Six under CORDA-the Committee for the Rehabilitation of Depressed Areas. On 12 June 1965, all property transactions in District Six were frozen. A 10-year ban was imposed on the erection or alteration of any building.