MARCO LONGARI / AFP Abdi Ismail Samatar reflects in the recent unrest in South Africa and compares it to Somalia, writing that South Africa will not collapse as Somalia did, there are extraordinary parallels between the postcolonial political histories of the two countries. Recent riots and the considerable loss of life and destruction of property in South Africa have caused alarm globally. This was also the case in Mogadishu, Somalia's war-ravaged capital. A few of Mogadishu's denizens who know that I annually spend several months at the University of Pretoria have urged me not to return there. This was surprising as I had just spent the past seven months in a city known for terrorism and violence.