ABSTRACT
Like most African states, South Africa has a legacy of the rural-urban dichotomy that had been bolstered by administrative structures. The tradition that colonial powers privileged as the customary was the one with the least historical depth, the aim being to use it in the day-to-day violence of the colonial system. As an ideological construct, successive white minority governments incorporated traditional authorities into the body politic. Besides the problem relating to the creation of tribal enclaves, the state had to mediate the positions of traditional authorities as state apparatus and as representatives of designated groups. Practically, traditional authorities were placed firmly in local administration under the pretext of Africans taking a greater degree of control of their affairs. Nonetheless, the use of traditional authorities in pursuance of the divide-and-rule policy was later to complicate the status of those authorities in the post-apartheid era. The Constitution provides for a role for traditional leadership at local level.
