The Nigerian barman of the Crippled Cock tavern in South Africa’s eastern city of Durban had the good fortune to be behind the till rather than mingling with customers on Tuesday night when a gang of 30 young men burst in looking for immigrants. While four fellow Nigerians in the lounge were set upon and badly beaten he fled through a side door.

“They were wearing long coats hiding their weapons, knives, axes and clubs,” Ben Chukwudi Ehiogu recalls. “They were saying we must go back to our country, we don’t want you here.”