Gezina was a constituency in the Transvaal Province of South Africa, which existed from 1929 to 1958 and again from 1966 to 1994. It covered an area in the northern suburbs of Pretoria, the administrative capital of South Africa, centred on the suburb of Gezina. Throughout its existence it elected one member to the House of Assembly and one to the Transvaal Provincial Council.
Franchise notes When the Union of South Africa was formed in 1910, the electoral qualifications in use in each pre-existing colony were kept in place. In the Transvaal Colony, and its predecessor the South African Republic, the vote was restricted to white men, and as such, elections in the Transvaal Province were held on a whites-only franchise from the beginning. The franchise was also restricted by property and education qualifications until the 1933 general election, following the passage of the Women's Enfranchisement Act, 1930 and the Franchise Laws Amendment Act, 1931. From then on, the franchise was given to all white citizens aged 21 or over. Non-whites remained disenfranchised until the end of apartheid and the introduction of universal suffrage in 1994.
History Gezina was first created in 1929, as part of the general expansion of the House of Assembly for that year's general election. It mainly took territory from the Wonderboom seat, whose MP Barend Jacobus Pienaar moved to the new seat - however, he left parliament after just three months. This provided an opportunity for National Party stalwart Oswald Pirow, who had just failed in his bid to unseat Jan Smuts from the Standerton constituency, to return to parliament. Pirow would represent Gezina until 1943, and became controversial during World War II as perhaps the most outspoken supporter of Nazi Germany in high-level South African politics. This resulted in him breaking with the National Party in 1942 to found his own "New Order" movement - however, he did not stand for re-election in 1943, and his seat went to an NP member.
From then on, as it had been before, Gezina was a safe Nationalist seat. It was abolished in the 1958 delimitation, with its MP moving to the new seat of Hercules, but in 1966 it was recreated. In its second iteration, it had only two MPs - Jan Hendrik Visse, who moved there from Prinshof in 1966 and served until his departure from parliament in 1975, and Karel David Swanepoel, who was elected in 1975 and held the seat until the end of apartheid. He faced stiff opposition from the Conservative Party at the 1987 and 1989 by-elections, but unlike some other Pretoria seats, Gezina stuck with the governing party.
Members ElectionMemberParty 1929 B. J. Pienaar National 1929 by Oswald Pirow 1933 1934 United 1938 1940 HNP 1942 New Order 1943 S. J. Swanepoel HNP 1948 A. I. Malan 1953 National 1958 constituency abolished ElectionMemberParty 1966 J. H. Visse National 1970 1974 1975 by K. D. Swanepoel 1977 1981 1987 1989 1994 constituency abolished Schoeman, B.M. (1977). Parlementêre verkiesings in Suid-Afrika 1910-1976. Pretoria: Aktuele Publikasies. Standard Encyclopaedia of Southern Africa (1972). "House of Assembly" (vol. 5, pp. 617–636). Cape Town: Nasionale Opvoedkundige Uitgewery (Nasou). South Africa 1980/81: Official Yearbook of the Republic of South Africa. Johannesburg: Chris van Rensburg Publications. South Africa 1983: Official Yearbook of the Republic of South Africa. Johannesburg: Chris van Rensburg Publications. Government Gazette of South Africa, No. 10751. 22 May 1987. Pretoria: Government of South Africa. Government Gazette of South Africa, No. 12109. 20 September 1989. Pretoria: Government of South Africa.
Detailed results Elections in the 1920s
Elections in the 1930s
References