49-537: The Free State ( Sotho : Freistata ; Afrikaans : Vrystaat [ˈfrɛistɑːt] ; Xhosa : iFreyistata ; Tswana : Foreistata ; Zulu : iFuleyisitata ), formerly known as the Orange Free State , is a province of South Africa . Its capital is Bloemfontein , which is also South Africa 's judicial capital. Its historical origins lie in the Boer republic called the Orange Free State and later
98-592: A language or dialect very closely related to modern Sesotho, the Zambian Sotho–Tswana language Lozi is also sometimes cited as a modern dialect of Sesotho named Serotse or Sekololo . The oral history of the Basotho and Northern Sotho peoples (as contained in their liboko ) states that 'Mathulare, a daughter of the chief of the Bafokeng nation (an old and respected people), was married to chief Tabane of
147-400: A public hospital. They are able to reach far-flung areas in only 45 minutes and deliver a high level of care on scene. On 31 October 2018, Free State Emergency Medical Service launched an additional 65 road ambulances to augment the fleet. The Free State has many public and private hospitals. The province is the granary of South Africa, with agriculture central to its economy, while mining on
196-598: A rare form of vowel-height (alternatively, advanced tongue root ) harmony. In total, the language contains some 39 consonantal and 9 vowel phonemes . It also has a large number of complex sound transformations which often change the phones of words due to the influence of other (sometimes invisible) sounds. Sesotho makes a three-way distinction between lightly ejective , aspirated and voiced stops in several places of articulation . The standard Sesotho clicks tend to be substituted with dental clicks in regular speech. The most striking properties of Sesotho grammar, and
245-501: A set of idioms but used with the grammar and inflexion rules of another language (usually Sesotho or Zulu ). It is a part of the youth culture in most Southern Gauteng townships and is the primary language used in Kwaito music . The sound system of Sesotho is unusual in many respects. It has ejective consonants , click consonants , a uvular trill , a relatively large number of affricate consonants , no prenasalised consonants , and
294-408: A succession of flat grassy plains sprinkled with pastureland, resting on a general elevation of 3,800 feet only broken by the occasional hill or kopje . The rich soil and pleasant climate allow for a thriving agricultural industry. The province is high-lying, with almost all land being 1,000 metres above sea level. The Drakensberg and Maloti Mountains foothills raise the terrain to over 2,000 m in
343-794: Is Maqueen Letsoha-Mathae of the African National Congress (ANC), who has held the position since 2024. The provincial legislature is elected every five years by a system of party-list proportional representation and meets at the Vierde Raadsaal in Bloemfontein . The politics of the Free State has been dominated by the ANC since the end of Apartheid. The ANC has won a majority of the vote in every provincial election since 1994. The most recent provincial election
392-583: Is also related to Lozi ( Silozi ), with which it forms the Sesotho-Lozi group within Sotho-Tswana. The Northern Sotho group is geographical, and includes a number of dialects also closely related to Sotho-Lozi. Tswana is also known as "Western Sesotho". The Sotho-Tswana group is in turn closely related to the other Southern Bantu languages, including the Venda , Tsonga , Tonga , Lozi which
441-547: Is an agglutinative language that uses numerous affixes and derivational and inflexional rules to build complete words . Sotho is a Southern Bantu language belonging to the Niger–Congo language family within the Sotho-Tswana branch of Zone S (S.30) . "Sotho" is also the name given to the entire Sotho-Tswana group, in which case Sesotho proper is called "Southern Sotho". Within the Sotho-Tswana group, Southern Sotho
490-634: Is based in Bloemfontein , the provincial capital. The Free State Division of the High Court of South Africa also sits in Bleomfontein. Like South Africa's other provinces, the Free State has a parliamentary system of government, with the provincial premier elected by the Free State Provincial Legislature . The premier then selects the members of the provincial Executive Council (cabinet). The current premier
539-519: Is evidenced by the shift of tertiary institutions such as the University of the Free State from solely using Afrikaans as the medium of instruction to using both Afrikaans and English, and eventually only English. The population of the Free State is overwhelmingly Christian . As of the 2022 census, 92.7% of the population described themselves as Christians , the third-highest proportion among South Africa's provinces. Among other religions, 4.9% of
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#1732765965675588-551: Is found in the Free State, particularly in the regions around Clarens , Bethlehem , Ficksburg , Ladybrand and Wepener . Sotho language Sotho ( / s ɛ ˈ s uː t uː / ) Sesotho , also known as Southern Sotho or Sesotho sa Borwa is a Southern Bantu language of the Sotho–Tswana ("S.30") group, spoken in Lesotho , and South Africa where it is an official language . Like all Bantu languages , Sesotho
637-467: Is mutually unintelligible with standard Sesotho and thus cannot in any sense be termed a dialect of it. The occasional tendency to label all minor languages spoken in Lesotho as "dialects" of Sesotho is considered patronising, in addition to being linguistically inaccurate and in part serving a national myth that all citizens of Lesotho have Sesotho as their mother tongue. Additionally, being derived from
686-648: Is native to Zambia and the other surrounding Southern African countries and Nguni languages , and possibly also the Makua (zone P) languages of Tanzania and Mozambique . Sotho is the root word. Various prefixes may be added for specific derivations, such as Sesotho for the Sotho language and Basotho for the Sotho people . Use of Sesotho rather than Sotho for the language in English has seen increasing use since
735-569: Is one of the most important in the southern hemisphere. Petrochemicals company Sasol , based in the town of Sasolburg , is a world leader in the production of fuels, waxes, chemicals and low-cost feedstock from coal. In the northeastern Free State, nestled in the rolling foothills of the Maluti mountains, the Golden Gate Highlands National Park is the province's prime tourist attraction. The park gets its name from
784-527: Is one of the top ten Maize producers in the world (12,365,000 tons as of 2013). Field crops yield almost two-thirds of the gross agricultural income of the province. Animal products contribute a further 30%, with the balance generated by horticulture. Ninety percent of the country's cherry crop is produced in the Ficksburg district, which is also home to the country's two largest asparagus canning factories. Soya, sorghum, sunflowers and wheat are cultivated in
833-439: Is the 4th comprehensive census performed by Statistics South Africa (Stats SA). The census results were released on 10 October 2023 and recorded a total of 62 million people in the country. The first reports of statistics, published on 10 October 2023, showed a total population of 62,027,503. 81,4% of the population is black African . The median age of the total population is 28 years. change The census taking period
882-588: Is the only province in which native Sotho-speakers form a majority of the population. It is also the province with the third-highest proportion of Afrikaans speakers, after the Western Cape and the Northern Cape . Sesotho is the dominant home language in most of the province. Zulu is the major language in the far eastern municipality of Phumelela . Setswana is the main language in Tokologo in
931-598: The Orange Free State Province . The current borders of the province date from 1994 when the Bantustans were abolished and reincorporated into South Africa. It is also the only one of the four original provinces of South Africa not to undergo border changes, apart from the reincorporation of Bantustans, and its borders date from before the outbreak of the Boer War . The Free State is situated on
980-469: The Vaal Triangle – where multilingualism and polylectalism are very high. Sesotho is one of the twelve official languages of South Africa , one of the two official languages of Lesotho and one of the sixteen official languages of Zimbabwe . Sesotho is one of the many languages from which tsotsitaals are derived. Tsotsitaal is not a proper language, as it is primarily a unique vocabulary and
1029-672: The (Southern) Bakgatla (a branch of the Bahurutse , who are one of the most ancient of the Sotho–Tswana tribes), and bore the founders of five tribes: Bapedi (by Mopedi), Makgolokwe (by Kgetsi), Baphuthing (by Mophuthing, and later the Mzizi of Dlamini , connected with the present-day Ndebele ), Batlokwa (by Kgwadi), and Basia (by Mosia). These were the first peoples to be called "Basotho", before many of their descendants and other peoples came together to form Moshoeshoe I 's nation in
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#17327659656751078-594: The 1980s, especially in South African English and in Lesotho. Except for faint lexical variation within Lesotho, and for marked lexical variation between the Lesotho/ Free State variety and that of the large urban townships to the north (such as Soweto ) due to heavy borrowing from neighbouring languages, there is no discernible dialect variation in this language. However, one point that seems to often confuse authors who attempt to study
1127-596: The 2,726 European immigrants born in non- British states, 1,025 came from the Russian Empire , mainly Jews . In 1904 whites made up a majority in most settlements, namely Ficksburg (52.3%), Wepener (60.2%), Ladybrand (60.0%), and Kroonstad (51.6%), and made up a substantial minority in Bloemfontein (45.7%) and Winburg (36.3%). In the 2022 census, 72.3% of the population reported their first language as Sotho , 10.3% as Afrikaans , 5.5% as Xhosa , 5.3% as Setswana , and 1.5% as English . The Free State
1176-404: The Free State also supply a substantial portion of the total silver produced in the country, while considerable concentrations of uranium occurring in the gold-bearing conglomerates of the goldfields are extracted as a byproduct. Bituminous coal is also mined, and converted to petrochemicals at Sasolburg. The Free State also produces high-quality diamonds from its kimberlite pipes and fissures, and
1225-469: The brilliant shades of gold cast by the sun on the spectacular sandstone cliffs, especially the imposing Brandwag or Sentinel Rock, which keeps vigil over the park. The sandstone of this region has been used for the lovely dressed-stone buildings found on the Eastern Highlands, while decoratively painted Sotho houses dot the grasslands. Some of South Africa's most valued San (Bushman) rock art
1274-496: The country's largest deposit of bentonite is found in the Koppies district. Since 1989, the Free State economy has moved from dependence on primary sectors such as mining and agriculture to an economy increasingly oriented towards manufacturing and export. Some 14% of the province's manufacturing is classified as being in high-technology industries – the highest of all provincial economies. The northern Free State's chemicals sector
1323-436: The dialectology of Sesotho is the term Basotho , which can variously mean " Sotho–Tswana speakers ", "Southern Sotho and Northern Sotho speakers ", "Sesotho speakers", and "residents of Lesotho." The Nguni language Phuthi has been heavily influenced by Sesotho; its speakers have mixed Nguni and Sotho–Tswana ancestry. It seems that it is sometimes treated erroneously as a dialect of Sesotho called "Sephuthi." However, Phuthi
1372-413: The early 19th century. The situation is even further complicated by various historical factors, such as members of parent clans joining their descendants or various clans calling themselves by the same names (because they honour the same legendary ancestor or have the same totem). An often repeated story is that when the modern Basotho nation was established by King Moshoeshoe I , his own "dialect" Sekwena
1421-452: The east experience frequent snowfalls, especially on the higher ranges, whilst the west can be extremely hot in summer. Almost all precipitation falls in the summer months as brief afternoon thunderstorms , with aridity increasing towards the west. Areas in the east around Harrismith , Bethlehem and Ficksburg are well watered. The capital, Bloemfontein , experiences hot, moist summers and cold, dry winters frequented by severe frost. In
1470-642: The east. The Free State lies in the heart of the Karoo Sequence of rocks, containing shales , mudstones , sandstones and the Drakensberg Basalt forming the youngest capping rocks. Mineral deposits are plentiful, with gold and diamonds being of particular importance, mostly found in the north and west of the province. The flats in the south of the reserve provide ideal conditions for large herds of plain game such as black wildebeest and springbok . The ridges, koppies and plains typical of
1519-422: The eastern Free State, where farmers specialise in seed production. About 40% of the country's potato yield comes from the province's high-lying areas. The main vegetable crop is asparagus, both white and green varieties. Although horticulture is expanding and becoming increasingly export-orientated, most produce leaves the province unprocessed. The Free State's advantage in floriculture is the opposing seasons of
Free State (province) - Misplaced Pages Continue
1568-599: The first extension period. The issue of under-counting in the Western Cape Province was a serious issue of concern for the Western Cape Provincial government as it might result in fewer resources being allocated to the province by national government on a per-capita basis relative to the rest of the country. Stats SA reported particular difficulty in getting an accurate census count of both White and Coloured residents which accounted for
1617-500: The low census participation rate in the Western Cape province. In the Western Cape census workers reported difficulty in contacting households with high walls - thereby preventing many surveys from being conducted - whilst other households refused to participate in the census. Other problems encountered by Stats SA in the province included not being able to hire enough census workers or being able to secure enough vehicles. After
1666-600: The most important properties which reveal it as a Bantu language, are its noun gender and concord systems. The grammatical gender system does not encode sex gender, and indeed, Bantu languages in general are not grammatically marked for gender. Another well-known property of the Bantu languages is their agglutinative morphology. Additionally, they tend to lack any grammatical case systems, indicating noun roles almost exclusively through word order. 2022 South African census The South African National Census of 2022
1715-599: The northern section are home to kudu , red hartebeest , southern white rhinoceros and buffalo . The Southern African wildcat , black wildebeest , zebra , eland , white rhinoceros and wild dog can be seen at the Soetdoring Nature Reserve near Bloemfontein . The South African cheetahs were reintroduced in the Free State for the first time in June 2013 after a hundred years of regional extinction, at Laohu Valley Reserve near Philippolis . Following
1764-428: The northwest, and in and around the area of Thaba Nchu . Afrikaans is widely spoken throughout the province, as a first language for the majority of whites and coloureds (who constitute a minority) and as a second or third language by Sesotho, Setswana and Xhosa speakers. Although there are relatively few native English speakers, English is becoming increasingly important as the language of business and government. This
1813-699: The other hand, Doke & Mofokeng claims that the tendency of many Sesotho speakers to say for example ke ronngwe [kʼɪʀʊŋ̩ŋʷe] instead of ke romilwe [kʼɪʀuˌmilʷe] when forming the perfect of the passive of verbs ending in -ma [mɑ] (as well as forming their perfects with -mme [m̩me] instead of -mile [mile] ) is "a relic of the extinct Tlokwa dialect". According to the South African National Census of 2011 , there were almost four million first language Sesotho speakers recorded in South Africa – approximately eight per cent of
1862-413: The population are black Africans who speak Sotho as a first language. The vast majority of White people in the Free State are Afrikaners . The proportion of whites in the province has shrunk considerably since the nineteenth century. In 1880 the white population made up 45.7% of the total population. In 1904 this had fallen to 36.8%. Of the 142,679 people in 1904, only 60% were born in the province. Of
1911-513: The population stated that they practiced Traditional African religions, and 0.5% of the population described themselves as Muslim . 1.4% of the population described themselves as being atheist, agnostic, or having no religious affiliation. The Free State Province is divided into one metropolitan municipality and four district municipalities . The district municipalities are in turn divided into 19 local municipalities : The Free State's major towns include: The Free State provincial government
1960-530: The population. Most Sesotho speakers in South Africa reside in Free State and Gauteng . Sesotho is also the main language spoken by the people of Lesotho , where, according to 1993 data, it was spoken by about 1,493,000 people, or 85% of the population. The census fails to record other South Africans for whom Sesotho is a second or third language. Such speakers are found in all major residential areas of Metropolitan Municipalities – such as Johannesburg , and
2009-437: The prior census in 2011 . It recorded the slowest population growth among South Africa's nine provinces between 2011 and 2022. It is also the second-least populous and second-least densely populated province. The median age is 28, an increase of 3 years from 2011. In the 2022 census, 88.9% of the population described themselves as Black African , 8.0% as White , 2.6% as Coloured , and 0.4% as Indian/Asian . The majority of
Free State (province) - Misplaced Pages Continue
2058-568: The publication of the census results it was reported that the under-count rate was 31% with the under-count rate being the highest in the Western Cape. The high under-count rate was reported as an issue of concern as it raised questions about the accuracy of the number of white, Indian, foreign-born and homeless people recorded in the census. In August 2024 STATS SA announced that due to reporting anomalies it would not be releasing key data such as figures on mortality, fertility, employment and household income. Despite these criticisms, most notably
2107-559: The reintroduction of an adult female South African cheetah in early 2016, three wild cheetah cubs were born for the first time in Laohu Valley Reserve in February 2017, making the three new cubs the first cheetahs born in the wild since their disappearance from the Free State province in over a century. The Free State experiences a continental climate , characterised by warm to hot summers and cool to cold winters. Areas in
2156-436: The rich goldfields reef is its largest employer. Agriculture dominates the Free State landscape, with cultivated land covering 32,000 square kilometres, and natural veld and grazing a further 87,000 square kilometres of the province. It is also South Africa's leader in the production of biofuels, or fuel from agricultural crops, with a number of ethanol plants under construction in the grain-producing western region. South Africa
2205-405: The southeast, the Free State borders seven districts of Lesotho : Domestically, it borders the following provinces: The Free State borders more districts of Lesotho and more provinces of South Africa than any other province. It is traversed by the northwesterly line of equal latitude and longitude. As of the 2022 census , the Free State had a population of 2,961,864, an increase of 8.0% from
2254-432: The southern and northern hemispheres. The Free State is also rich in mineral wealth, gold representing 20% of the world's total gold production. Mining is the province's major employer. The province has 12 gold mines, producing 30% of South Africa's output and making it the fifth-largest producer of gold in the world. The Harmony Gold Refinery and Rand Refinery are the only two gold refineries in South Africa. Gold mines in
2303-465: Was chosen over two other popular variations Setlokwa and Setaung and that these two still exist as "dialects" of modern Sesotho. The inclusion of Setlokwa in this scenario is confusing, as the modern language named "Setlokwa" is a Northern Sesotho language spoken by descendants of the same Batlokwa whose attack on the young chief Moshoeshoe's settlement during Lifaqane (led by the famous widow Mmanthatisi ) caused them to migrate to present-day Lesotho. On
2352-402: Was extended in the Western Cape province to 14 May 2022 after it was announced that only 58% of the province's population had participated in it by late April that year; whilst around 80% of the country's whole population had been surveyed by the same date. The deadline was extended a second time in the Western Cape to 31 May as only 78% of the province's population had been counted by the end of
2401-458: Was held in 2024 . The ANC again won the election, albeit with a sharply reduced majority. The Democratic Alliance (DA) retained its position as the province's second largest party and official opposition , with a significant increase in its share of the vote. The results of the 2024 provincial election are as follows: The Free State is the only province in South Africa that operates a free 24-hour dedicated rotor-wing aeromedical service from
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