By 1795 Ndlambe, regent of the Rharhabe chiefdom, stood out as the most powerful Xhosa chief in the western flank of Xhosa society. However, he was toppled at around that time by Ngqika, who was then only sixteen or seventeen years old. He fled west of the Fish where he sought to subordinate the Zuurveld chiefs to his authority.
Ngqika (1780–1829), grandson of Rharhabe and the senior chief in western Xhosaland.
In the early years of the century Ngqika looked like a major new political force. Intelligent and determined, he had a burning ambition and a ruthless disposition. He concentrated power by deposing coun cillors and bringing their people directly under him and seizing the entire estate of deceased commoners. Early in the next century he had come to see himself as the supreme chief of all the Xhosa and was recognised as such by the government in Cape Town.
But the seeds of his downfall had already been sown. He never recovered from the clash with Ndlambe, who remained a formidable enemy. Ngqika turned out to be a petulant, avaricious and short-sighted leader who betrayed his people for personal gain. His alliance with the frontier colonists helped him little. His hunger for power and wealth alienated many followers. Many moved into the Zuurveld to escape his clutches.
On the colonial side there were still farmers harbouring a grievance about cattle losses in previous wars. Some of the disaffected frontiersmen set free Adriaan van Jaarsveld, a burgher commandant with some popular support, after he was arrested early in 1799 on a charge of fraud. The ideas of the rebels were vague, but they hoped that Coenraad de Buys would enlist Ngqika’s help to assist them in overcoming the Zuurveld Xhosa and in defeating any British attempt to subjugate them.
The new British rulers lost little time in setting out to crush the rebellion. The arrival on the frontier of a British force that included some 50 Khoikhoi soldiers and the arrest of the rebel leaders made a powerful impression on the frontier Khoikhoi. A crowd of some 500 Khoikhoi servants under Klaas Stuurman rebelled against their masters and made off with guns and clothes and then flocked to the military force. They asked the commander to restore Khoikhoi independence before departing. A court declared later that the Khoikhoi had either been incited or had acted from ‘a notion they also have conceived of liberty and equality’.
