South African Geographical Names Council
Geographical names advisory body
The South African Geographical Names Council (SAGNC) is the official government body of South Africa that advises the executive branch of the central government (in the form of the Minister of Arts and Culture) on new geographical names as well as the changing of existing geographical names. The Council also receives recommendations from provincial geographical names committees, such as the Western Cape Provincial Geographical Names Committee.
The new Council in the 1998 law replaced the previous "National Place Names Committee of South Africa".
Purpose of the Council
The Council was established by the South African Geographical Names Council Act 118 of 1998. The purpose of the act, according to its preamble, is: "To establish a permanent advisory body known as the South African Geographical Names Council to advise the Minister responsible for Arts and Culture on the transformation and standardisation of geographical names in South Africa for official purposes; to determine its objects, functions and methods of work; and to provide for matters connected therewith."
A "geographical name" is defined as any terrestrial feature within the territorial limits of the Republic of South Africa, together with any that fall under the jurisdiction of the Republic as acquired by treaty, regardless of whether the feature is natural or made or adapted by human agency, or whether it is populated or unpopulated.
The Council is tasked with providing both the name of each geographical feature and the written form of that name.
Composition of the Council
The Council must consist of no fewer than fifteen and no more than twenty-five members appointed by the Minister of Arts and Culture, of whom:
One must be nominated by each of the nine South African provinces.
One must be nominated by each of the following:
The South African Post Office.
The Chief Directorate: National Geo-spatial Information.
The Pan South African Language Board.
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This entry incorporates text from “South African Geographical Names Council” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.