We must not underplay what the instigators of last week’s devastating events in SA wanted to achieve. What we saw was a malevolent plan to take us to war and turn our beautiful, peaceful, imperfect and democratic country into a broken nation and failed state.

It was a deliberate and calculated campaign to turn poor against rich, black against white and Indian, Zulu against Xhosa, haves against have-nots — and for the instigators to watch as we shot each other, invaded each other’s homes, barricaded ourselves against each other, railed against each other and ultimately killed each other...