10 Countries Where The Capital Isn’t The City That You’d Expect

Yet another former British Dominion (it’s the last one, promise), South Africa is unique amongst the nations of the world in that is has three official capitals. A handful of others have two, though in almost every case this is narrowed down to one ‘legal’ capital within their constitution or other principal-setting document.

Cape Town, Pretoria and Bloemfontein are given equal footing within this quirky setup, serving as the legislative, administrative and judicial capitals respectively. Each of these are major cities in their own right, with Cape Town boasting around 4 million, Pretoria around 3.2 million and Bloemfontein around 700,000 inhabitants, but none of them are Johannesburg.

The most iconic and populous city in South Africa, Johannesburg (or Joburg for short) serves as a cultural and commercial hub, responsible for almost 20% of the country’s economy. To throw a spanner into the works of the complex capital situation, it also plays host to the Constitutional Court of South Africa.

Yet Joburg, built on a gold and diamond rush in the early 20th century, was not particularly significant when South Africa as we know it came to be. The 1901 union of the Cape Colony, Natal Colony, Transvaal and Orange Free State was marred by an inability to decide which of the four previous capitals should be elevated to official status. The eventual compromise could only narrow four down to three, removing Pietermaritzburg (capital of Natal Colony) from the equation and creating the structure we see today.