Culture, History, Heritage and Entertainment
a Museum for the whole Family, Friends & Relatives!
ORGANIZATIONAL BACKGROUND
The Mphebatho Cultural Museum (MCP), and Moruleng Cultural Precinct, is a community based orgaisation, the very first one of its kind in a rural environment. It was initiated by Kgosi Nyalala Molefe Pilane of the Bakgatla Ba Kgafela (BBK), launched in September 24th 1999. It was originally a School, Ofentse Primary named after Kgosi Ofentse, built in 1937. It was subsequently refurbished towards the 2010 FIFA Soccer World Cup to magnify tourism potential and interest during the period. Kgosi Pilane and the Bakgatla-ba-Kgafela Traditional Administration started the process to redevelop the museum and the cultural precinct in Moruleng, North West, and was officially opened in April 2015. The development brought about strategies that enhanced opportunities offered, not only within the BBK communities, but even beyond to those individuals, companies and organisations involved in the tourism and heritage industries in and around the Pilanesberg region and the Province.
The MCP now consists of the Mphebatho Museum, Crafts shop, coffee shop, outdoor amphitheatre, restored 126 years old church, bell-tower viewing deck and Kgosi Pilane’s 1800’s replicated Iron Age cultural village.
The proposed development and protection of the identified Bakgatla Ba Kgafela’s heritage sites will be a stimulating addition and a new dimension to the co-existing tourism products and attractions.
THE HISTORY BEHIND IT ALL
The Bakgatla-ba-Kgafela is one community split across the border between South Africa nad Botswana. We are a community divided by history and by an international border, but are connected in every other way
In 1870, a group of Bakgatla-ba-Kgafela left their home in Saulspoort, now Moruleng, after ongoing disputes with the Transvaal Boers, which culminated in the public flogging of Kgosi Kgamanyane by Paul Kruger. The tribe settled in Mochudi, in what is now Botswana.
After helping the British defeat the Boers in the South African war (1899-1902), Kgosi Linchwe sent his brother Ramono and some members of the royal family back to South Africa to represent him at the request of the Bakgatla-ba-Kgafela who had remained in Saulspoort.
Since then the Moruleng and the Mochudi communities have been closely connected under the same traditions and cultural practices. Split by an international border, however, we have been developing under very different political and economic circumstances. While Botswana won independence in 1966, the Bakgatla-ba-Kgafela in South Africa became one of thousands of marginalized rural communities, suffering the devastating effects of apartheid, and later ‘homeland’, rule
INDEGENOUS GAMES, ACTIVITIES & RELAXATION
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Indegenous Games
Drumming
African Dance
Story Telling
Special Offers
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info@mphebathomuseum.org.za
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