Premium from the FT – Extremists on both sides are dangerous in every challenge, climate change included
Nothing good ever comes from emotion. The more that extremists are involved, the higher the emotion and the greater the danger. Yesterday, ratepayers in the small Western Cape municipality of Swellendam witnessed a very practical example (see below).
A seemingly obvious and apparently productive new administrative requirement (registration by indigent households) became an opportunity for extremists. The result: arsonists torched the municipal offices, needlessly destroying the nerve centre of one of SA's better managed local authorities.
Lest we forget, there's an election next year so this is merely an appetiser. SA's Police Services is infested with deployed cadres, so as with the July 2021 KZN Riots, society cannot depend on these protectors of public property to do their duty when extremist political agendas are being served. As they surely were in little Swellendam.
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