One of the
homelands or
Bantustans of
South Africa under the
apartheid regime, the nominal home of the
Pedi people, the northern branch of the
Basotho. (The southern Sotho lands are
Lesotho and
Qwaqwa.)
Lebowa means '
north'; it was carved out of
Transvaal. The capital was
Lebowakgomo.
Originally eleven patches of land on its creation in August 1969, it was consolidated to three, and granted self-government on 2 October 1972. The chief ministers were Mokgama Motlala 1969-1973, Cedric Phatudi 1973-1987, and Mogoboya Ramodike 1987-1994. Like the other homelands it was fully reabsorbed into South Africa on 27 April 1994.
The motto was Mphiri o tee ga o lle 'a single bangle cannot produce a sound'. The flag (adopted in 1974) was horizontal stripes of light blue over white over green, with a yellow sunrise over the wide white stripe.