Venda kingship disputes, 1890s to 2020s

Venda kingship disputes, 1890s to 2020s: an overview

For well over a century the question of who, if anyone, is king of all the Vhavenda has been fought over: by brothers in 1895, by the South African Republic and the apartheid state, which made and unmade kingships to suit themselves, by the homeland government that abolished the title in 1991, by two commissions of inquiry, and since 2010 in the High Court, the Supreme Court of Appeal and the Constitutional Court. This article follows that history from the death of Makhado to the latest court reports we found, mostly through Lufuno Mulaudzi’s 2020 doctoral thesis, the determinations of the Commission on Traditional Leadership Disputes and Claims, and the courts’ own summaries. It takes no side on who should hold any office.

The story

Before the twentieth century. The contests of 1864 and 1895, between Davhana and Makhado and between Maemu and Mphephu I, are told in The Ramabulana succession, 1864 to 1895, and the fights over Tsianda, Lwamondo and Dzimauli in The Venda succession wars of the 1880s. By the 1890s the Republic had become part of the dispute: Mulaudzi says it appointed Makhado’s second son Sinthumule as king in 1898, as Mphephu I fled to Bulawayo (see Sinthumule and Mphephu I). Mphephu I came back with British help and settled in the Nzhelele valley, where, the Commission’s record says, he died in January 1925; Mulaudzi gives 1924. By the 1920s, Mulaudzi counts the Venda country as divided among seven independent vhuhosi: Mphephu, Tshivhase, Mphaphuli, Rambuda, Sinthumule, Nesengani and Kutama.

The Commission’s finding on the old kingship. The Commission on Traditional Leadership Disputes and Claims later found that the Vhavenda kingship was created around 1600 by Dimbanyika and “destroyed” by the Voortrekkers in 1898, which is why the claims it heard concerned restoration (see Ramabulana and Dimbanyika). The Tshivhase, Mphaphuli, Ravhura and Vhangona houses each told it a different story of the house of Vele-la-Mbeu and of who kept the kingship at the split at Dzata (see Tshivhase, Mphaphuli, Ravhura and Vhangona).

The state’s hand, 1951 to 1988. The Bantu Authorities Act of 1951 created, in Venda, 25 tribal authorities, three regional authorities and one territorial authority; the Thohoyandou Territorial Authority was formed in 1962 under Chief Patrick Mphephu (Fokwang, as on our Tshivhase Traditional Council page). Mulaudzi writes that Patrick Ramaano Mphephu was crowned at Dzanani on 24 February 1950, that he chaired the territorial authority and that all the other vhothovhele were politically under it, and that in 1973 he became Chief Minister, from which, in Mulaudzi’s words, he rose from head of a small clan to “the most powerful politician and khosikhulu in Venda” (ch. 6, ch. 7). The Mphaphuli house says the 1951 Act cost it areas and Tsonga subjects (see Mphaphuli Traditional Council); the other houses perceive that Mphephu was chosen head of the Venda state because the Tshivhase and Mphaphuli declined the apartheid offer (ch. 9, p. 203). Venda received nominal “independence” from South Africa on 13 September 1979, which most Venda people and the international community rejected, with Mphephu as its first president; in May 1983 a bill made him Life President, opposed by the Venda Independent Party, and a one-party bill was later argued for on the ground that Western-style democracy did not suit a country led by a Life President (ch. 7; see Mphephu). In disputes inside other houses, Mulaudzi gives the Kutama as an example: after Johannes Kutama died in 1959, a relative acted as thovhele while the heir, Peter, was a minor; Peter grew up to be a critic of Mphephu and was detained for more than three months in 1978 (ch. 7, pp. 170 to 173; see Kutama). Kennedy Tshivhase’s installation as heir in 1970 and the regency of an uncle are on our Kennedy Tshivhase page.

1988 to 1991: new chiefs, a coup, and an abolition. Patrick Mphephu died in April 1988. Frank Ravele, then a gota, was elected president on 10 May 1988; in 1989, with two other magota, he was promoted to khosi in a way the Mushasha Commission later found irregular, because the director-general had advised that the Khoro ya Mahosi and the Territorial Council must first be consulted (ch. 7, ch. 8, pp. 187 to 195; see Ravele). In 1990 Brigadier Gabriel Ramushwana took over by a military coup and on 18 May 1990 appointed the Mushasha Commission, which reversed the irregular promotions (so the 32 vhothovhele of 1990 became fewer) and led to the Venda Traditional Leaders Administration Proclamation, No. 29 of 1991 (see Mushasha Commission, Ramushwana and the 1991 Proclamation). The Proclamation listed 26 recognised communities, ended the status of khosikhulu, and let the chairman recognise, divide, merge or depose communities and their heads (ch. 8, pp. 195 to 198). Mulaudzi reads it as having eroded the kingship and counts 28 vhothovhele today. Two scholars he cites argue that Ramushwana wanted the kingship portrayed as an apartheid imposition in order to loosen a constitutional rule tying the head of state to the khosikhulu (ch. 8, pp. 195 to 196). Venda leaders interviewed in 2015 and 2016 disagreed: a Tshivhase leader and the Manenzhe thovhele thought it right, the Mutele and a Madzivhandila leader thought it wrong (ch. 10, pp. 248 to 276).

The 1990s: installations and a first commission. In 1993 Kennedy Tshivhase, after winning a legal suit against his uncle, took office at Mukumbani; Fokwang reports that Ramushwana and Walter Sisulu attended (see Kennedy Tshivhase). Venda was reincorporated into South Africa in 1994. On 2 February 1996 the Premier of the Northern Province, Ngoako Ramatlodi, set up the Ralushai Commission under Professor N. V. Ralushai to hear claims by traditional leaders irregularly deposed or not recognised under the earlier governments; it heard the Mphephu, Tshivhase and Davhana claims to kingship and the Mphaphuli claim to a vhuhosi, gave the Premier an interim report in 1997 and a final report in 1998 that was not made public (ch. 9, pp. 199 to 211; see Ralushai Commission). Mulaudzi says its final report was hard even for scholars to see.

The Nhlapo Commission. The Commission on Traditional Leadership Disputes and Claims, under Professor Thandabantu Nhlapo, was set up under the Traditional Leadership and Governance Framework Act of 2003 (Mulaudzi dates the Gazette notice to 2008, a community site to October 2004). On the Venda it heard five contenders: the Vhangona claim, to a kingship of the Vhavenda as a whole, by Tshidziwelele Azwidowi Nephawe; the Ramabulana claim by Toni Peter Mphephu Ramabulana; the Ravhura claim by Azwianewi David Mutshinyalo Ravhura; and new kingship claims by Kennedy Prince Midiavhathu Tshivhase and Phaswana Musiiwa Michael Mphaphuli (ch. 9, pp. 216 to 218; see Nhlapo Commission). The Davhana house lodged no claim. The Commission found for the Ramabulana: that the kingship created by Dimbanyika and destroyed in 1898 should be restored “under the lineage of Mphephu Ramabulana”, and that the other claims failed; among its reasons were that the Tshivhase and Mphaphuli houses had not created new communities with new identities, and that the Ramabulana house was the most senior of Vele-la-Mbeu’s descendants. The ruling was reported in January 2010.

The Mphephu house in court, 2010 to 2025. In August 2010 the Mphephu-Ramabulana Royal Family Council identified Toni Mphephu-Ramabulana as King of the Vhavenda, and the President recognised him in 2012. Princess Masindi Mphephu, a daughter of the late Tshimangadzi Mphephu (chief 1993 to 1997), challenged this, arguing that she was passed over because she is a woman; the Thohoyandou High Court dismissed her case on 14 December 2016, and the Supreme Court of Appeal, which heard the appeal on 17 May 2018, ruled in April 2019 that the criteria used promoted gender discrimination, set aside the President’s decision and declared the Council’s decision unlawful, without deciding who the heir is. On 12 November 2021 the Constitutional Court (CCT 121/20, [2021] ZACC 43) refused condonation for the family’s late application for leave to appeal and upheld Masindi’s cross-appeal on the stay of the Supreme Court’s order, so the kingship stood vacant. After this the family identified Mr Mavhungu David Mphephu as acting king; the Premier did not recognise him, and on 21 June 2024 the Constitutional Court (CCT 373/22, [2024] ZACC 12) declined to hear the matter directly. Hearings in the Polokwane High Court ran in January and June 2025 on whether Masindi was born to a dzekiso wife, the wife chosen to bear the heir, with witnesses for each side; the matter was reported postponed to December 2025. We found no report of a judgment (see Mphephu for the sources and for how to correct us). Mulaudzi, writing in 2020, treats the 2019 ruling as partly a victory for Masindi Mphephu, notes that the Limpopo and National Houses of Traditional Leaders upheld it, and argues the house should settle the matter itself; we record his view without adopting it (ch. 11, pp. 287 to 289).

Disputes beyond the throne. The same questions run down to headmanship. In Rambuda v Tshibvumo Royal Family (CCT 255/22, [2024] ZACC 15, decided 17 July 2024) the Constitutional Court held that the Rambuda Royal Family had the authority to identify a successor, that the Limpopo Premier had not lawfully followed the process for recognising a headman of Tshibvumo village, and sent the matter back to the Premier (see Rambuda).

What the disputes are about. Mulaudzi’s argument is that previous scholars looked only inside Venda for the motives of the disputing parties and that outside forces, the Republic, the apartheid state, the homeland government and the post-1994 state, have each helped make, unmake or decide the Venda kingship; he draws on comparisons with Nigeria, Cameroon and Botswana to say that state power and chiefly power have often been a “zero-sum game” (ch. 11, pp. 282 to 285). He also points to the Venda system itself, in which the makhadzi and the khotsimunene choose the heir, so that disputes arise within a house, and says many Nhlapo claims were driven by hopes of money and infrastructure (ch. 9). The community’s own position is varied: the leaders he interviewed gave contrasting views on the 1991 Proclamation, and agreed only that, in a Venda saying he reports, the beauty of the throne is “when it is fought for” (ch. 10, ch. 11).

Cautions

This article summarises other pages on this site; its main sources are Mulaudzi’s 2020 thesis, which states his own opinions and is read here from a machine-extracted copy with stray spaces and unreadable characters, so page numbers are approximate; the Commission’s determination, as presented on our house pages; and the courts’ own case summaries and press reports for 2010 to 2025. We have not read the Ralushai Commission’s reports, the Proclamation itself, or the High Court judgments. The reports of the 2025 hearings are from local newspapers and may differ in detail, and the dispute may have moved on since; if you know of a judgment, tell us and we will update. Dates differ between sources (Mphephu I’s death, 1924 or January 1925; the start of the Nhlapo Commission, 2004 or 2008; the Constitutional Court’s account of when the first review proceedings began, 2012). The disputes concern people who are alive, and living traditional councils, so we name office-holders only as the Commission, the courts or the thesis do, as public records. Where customary law is told differently by each side, we take none.

Sources and further reading

Lufuno J. P. Mulaudzi, “Historicising the politics of vhuhosivhuhulu: the Venda polity and state formation in South Africa, c.1800s-2020”, DPhil thesis, University of Pretoria (2020), chapters 6 to 11
Commission on Traditional Leadership Disputes and Claims: Determination on the Vhavenda kingship claim (pp. 608 to 664), as presented on our house pages for Ramabulana, Tshivhase, Mphaphuli, Ravhura and Vhangona
Constitutional Court of South Africa: Mphephu-Ramabulana and Another v Mphephu and Others (CCT 121/20, [2021] ZACC 43); Mphephu-Ramabulana Royal Family v Premier, Limpopo Province and Others (CCT 373/22, [2024] ZACC 12); Rambuda and Others v Tshibvumo Royal Family and Others (CCT 255/22, [2024] ZACC 15); case pages and summaries
The press reports listed on our Mphephu page (Sowetan 2019, The Citizen and Sunday World 2021, Mail and Guardian 2024, Zoutnet and Limpopo Chronicle 2025)
J. T. D. Fokwang, thesis (2003), University of Pretoria, on the Tshivhase chiefdom, as used on our Tshivhase Traditional Council and Kennedy Tshivhase pages

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