In April it was Nazis. Now it’s commies. The roast-chicken-denying Gestapo has faded from the headlines, replaced by the hammer and sickle — finally available at hardware shops — of full-blown Stalinism. SA, I read most days, has become the Soviet Union.

I must say I find this hard to believe, not least because the Soviet Union built power stations that worked and most Soviet kiddies could read by the time they reached their teens. Where the comparison really falls apart, however, is when it comes to dissent. In the USSR criticising the ruling Politburo made you a target. Here, it makes you the administrator of a Facebook group. In the USSR, members of the bourgeoisie who questioned the state were killed or sent to Siberia. In SA it’s only the poor who get beaten to death by soldiers...