"There you have it... we were not consulted. We can say nothing." The British assumed direct control of the territory in 1874. What is known for a fact is that the Griqua leader, whose name still adorns the town he founded, died in December 1875 after being severely injured in a wagon-accident. At his funeral, his cousin commented that with Kok's death, the Griquas' last hope for an independent state in Southern Africa had died as well. After coming under British rule, Griqualand East was administered by the British as a separate colony for several years. During this time, the Colonial Office put considerable pressure on the government of the neighbouring Cape Colony to annexe the costly and turbulent territory. However the Cape, newly under a system of responsible government, was reluctant to assume responsibility for Griqualand East due to its considerable expenses and its considerably resentful population. Incorporation into the Cape (1879) Although initially the Cape had refused to annex the territory, agreement was reached after substantial negotiation and in 1877 the Cape Parliament passed the Griqualand East Annexation Act (Act 38 of 1877). The act was only promulgated two years later on 17 September 1879, when four magistrates were set up, at Kokstad, Matatiele, Mount Frere and Umzimkulu. The territory was also given two elected seats in the Cape Parliament, which at the time was elected through the multi-racial "Cape Qualified Franchise" system, whereby qualifications for suffrage were applied to all males, regardless of race. The Griqua people had only ever been a small, ruling minority of the population of Griqualand East. Once independent Griqua rule was ended, the Xhosa speaking Pondo people, who had long constituted the majority of the Griqualand East population, came to own increasing amounts of land in the area, together with newly-arriving European settlers. These demographic factors led to a further dilution of Griqua identity and a century later, under Apartheid, the territory was incorporated into the Xhosa "homeland" of the Transkei. Contemporary Griqualand When the Union of South Africa was formed in 1910, the Cape Colony changed its name to "Cape Province," and during the 1980s, part of former Griqualand East was partitioned off into the Transkei, one of the four nominally independent Bantustans. In 1994, shortly before the first all-inclusive elections, it was incorporated into the southern part of the KwaZulu-Natal province. Kokstad retained its name and is today one of