ISMAIL LAGARDIEN: Echoes of the global far-right movement
From Italy to South Africa and the US, an obsession with purity and notions of superiority risk bathing us all in blood
There has been a rise of right-wing militancy, an emboldenment of white ethno-nationalism and creeping fascism across Europe and North America of a magnitude not seen since the period between the two world wars. The Weekend Financial Times of February 10 published a story on the rise of the far-right in Italy. Giorgia Meloni, a candidate in Italy’s elections, considers herself among the inheritors of Benito Mussolini’s fascism. In the report, a supporter identified only as "Daniela" made no bones about the hankering for the interwar fascist era in her reference to Rome: "This very city was built by Mussolini on a swamp and now what’s left?" Pointing to a group of black men she added, "There won’t be any white places left in Europe. Soon it’s all going to be black as coal." In SA these tendencies have produced echoes among a minority of people — as expressed by Dan Roodt of the Pro-Afrikaans Action Group (Praag) — who imagine themselves as the last stand, the canary in the coal mine ...
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