Rivhubye and were resettled on the eastern side. Most of the people in Phaphazela village come from Malonga in what is now Vuwani. Phaphazela used to be called Malonga in remembrance of their former lands. Some people of the Makhuvele lineage were removed from parts of what is now Thohoyandou. Thus some of the people of Malamulele are the Magwamba, who used to form the Xipilongo (Spelonken) Empire. There has also been communities that were moved from the Kruger National Park to settle in Malamulele. About 40,000 people were moved from west of Rivhubye and settled in Malamulele, whereas about 10,000 were moved from Malamulele and settled in what was to become Venda. Malamulele was the first town to be built in the former Gazankulu homeland, prior to Giyani. It was named by Chief Risimati Chanyela Mulamula. It was one of the former 7 districts of Gazankulu, namely Nkowankowa, N'wa-Mitwa, Lulekani, Mhala, Hlanganani, Giyani, and of course, Malamulele. At the end of apartheid, Malamulele was renamed to Levubu-Shingwedzi Transitional Local Municipality, after the two rivers. An amalgamation with Thohoyandou led to the Thulamela Local Municipality, which then centralised all administration and services in Thohoyandou. The years 2000 to 2015 saw consistent objections to the merger with Thohoyandou. In the last few years, the objections went from peaceful applications to the Municipal Demarcation Board to violent protests with property being damaged. The protests were mired with accusations of tribalism and denial, claiming all South African municipalities face service delivery protests. The issue was demonstrated to be imbalanced services between Thohoyandou areas and Malamulele areas. Even with poor service delivery, Thohoyandou areas still enjoyed better service in comparison to Malamulele areas. In July 2015, the Municipal Demarcation Board announced that a new municipality would be formed to serve Malamulele. In August 2016 the new Collins Chabane Local Municipality started to operate in Malamulele, it also serves Vuwani and Bungeni which were under Makhado Local Municipality before. Geography and climate Malamulele is a low-lying area at risk of flooding. There are a lot of hills, but no known mountains. The soil structure is mainly sandy grey soil (), which the area is named after. Malamulele is approximately 1551.93 km2 in land area. It has a perimeter of 178.283 km2. The area is sparsely populated with a lot of bush between neighbouring settlements. The town has a very dry subtropical climate, specifically a humid