Middelburg (House of Assembly of South Africa constituency)

Middelburg
Former constituency for the South African House of Assembly
Location of Middelburg within South Africa (1981)
Province	Transvaal
Electorate	24,251 (1989)
Former constituency
Created	1910 1966
Abolished	1948 1994
Number of members	1
Last MHA	H. J. Coetzee (CP)
Created from	Bethal-Middelburg (1966)
Replaced by	Bethal-Middelburg (1948) Mpumalanga (1994)

Middelburg was a constituency in the Transvaal Province of South Africa, which existed from 1910 to 1948 and from 1966 to 1994. Named after the town of Middelburg, it covered a part of the eastern Transvaal along the border with Eswatini. Throughout its existence it elected one member to the House of Assembly and one to the Transvaal Provincial Council.

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.^[1]

Like most of the rural Transvaal, Middelburg had a largely Afrikaans-speaking electorate. Its longest-serving MP, Jan Dirk Heyns, was initially elected for the National Party, but followed J. B. M. Hertzog into the United Party in 1934. Middelburg remained a UP seat until its abolition in 1948, even with Heyns retiring in 1938 and Hertzog bolting from the party in 1939, but the popularity of Jan Smuts in the Transvaal likely helped his party retain the seat.

In 1948, Middelburg was merged with the neighbouring seat of Bethal, but the two were separated again in 1966, and the recreated Middelburg constituency was safe for the NP. The governing party faced opposition mainly from the right, and in 1987, the Conservative Party managed to muster enough strength to capture the seat - they held it until the end of apartheid.

^{[2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7]}