Dr Beyers Naudé Local Municipality

Dr Beyers Naudé Municipality (Afrikaans: Dr Beyers Naudé Munisipaliteit; Xhosa: uMasipala wase Dr Beyers Naudé) is a local municipality within the Sarah Baartman District Municipality, in the Eastern Cape of South Africa. The municipality was established by merging the Camdeboo, Ikwezi and Baviaans local municipalities. The decision to merge the municipalities was taken by the Municipal Demarcation Board in 2015 but only took effect after municipal elections on 3 August 2016. The new municipality is named after the Afrikaner cleric and anti-apartheid activist Beyers Naudé. Its seat is in Graaff-Reinet. The merger was motivated by political interests because the ruling party, the African National Congress, was losing support in the area. One of the municipalities, Baviaans, was already governed by the opposition Democratic Alliance.