Richard AmmonBotswana Capital City of Gaborone
Gaborone is the capital and largest city of Botswana with a population of 195,000, about ten percent of the total population. (Botswana is a mostly rural country with only six cities.) Because the Gaborone had no major tribal affiliation, in ‘neutral territory,’ and was close to the fresh water in the Notwane River the city was planned to be the capital in the mid-1960s when the Bechuanaland Protectorate became the independent nation of Botswana from England. (It had been a British territory since 1885. Independence happened without warfare or a tyrant taking over.) The city is the economic and political hub of the country. It’s marked by a variety of architectural styles, from art nouveau to Bauhaus to colonial to sleek modern and has several modern shopping malls in the suburbs.
