Pietersburg (Polokwane) has been renamed locally , and subsequently nationally. However the validity of name change is being contested in court , and has been a contentious issue for 3 years. The outcome of the court ruling will determine whether or not the town(city) retains the original founding name.

What does it mean exactly to change the name of a settlement in a country with many languages? After all, many, if not most towns and cities have different names in different languages in South Africa. For example South Africa's legislative capital is Cape Town in English, Kaapstad in Afrikaans and SaseKapa in Xhosa.

Most of the city names which have changed in South Africa since 1994 are the same in the various languages, precisely because they haven't had the history or time to develop seperate names. Others which can be translated, are. For example the former Cape province was split in three, and the new names of the three provinces are new in all the languages (eg, Mpuma-Koloni is 'Eastern Cape' in Xhosa - both Eastern Cape and Mpuma-Koloni are new names, since before it was just the Cape and Koloni). Other times common speech still has to catch up with official changes. Pretoria is now officially Tshwane but English and Afrikaans-speakers still call it Pretoria, Zulus still call it Pitoli etc Joziboy 16 March 2006, 16:38 (UTC)