Experts downplay threat following terror arrests

South African police have announced a foiled plot by right-wing extremists to blow up black townships ahead of next month's World Cup, but experts say the group poses no threat to the country.

According to the special investigation unit, five white men have been charged with terrorism, after police discovered an arms cache and explosives, allegedly planned for use in attacks on black neighbourhoods.

The announcement of a foiled plot came last Friday. But political and security analysts say there is little risk of a terror attack by white extremists during the FIFA World Cup which stars on June 11, despite a recent spike in racial tensions in the country.

"I don't take the plot idea so seriously," said Dirk Kotze of the University of South Africa.

"It's not as if there's a right-wing movement or militias that exist that can be mobilised at any time," he told AFP.

"The last time there was any sort of attack from the right wing was in 1994, 16 years ago. It was at the time of the first (post-apartheid) election," said Mr Kotze.

The racial tension that lingers in South Africa 16 years after the end of white-minority rule resurfaced last month when Eugène Terre'Blanche, a far right leader, was bludgeoned to death at his farm house.

Two black men who worked on his farm have been charged with his murder.

Mr Terre'Blanche was the leader of a 1993 armed invasion of the building where multi-party negotiations on ending apartheid were taking place.

In the wake of his murder, Mr Terre'Blanche's Afrikaner Resistance Movement urged white South Africans to arm themselves, issuing a call - later retracted - to avenge his death.

Since the murder, police have made arms seizures and arrests linked to right-wing extremists in several parts of South Africa, the police minister said last week.

Mr Kotze said the far right no longer has the power it once had to disrupt the country.

"The extreme right wing was sort of activated by the death of Eugène Terre'Blanche," he said.

"But it doesn't mean that it's a well-organised movement with lots of members, and that therefore they can now mobilise for this period of the World Cup. They simply don't have the infrastructure and the organisation to do that."

Mr Terre'Blanche's murder raised concerns about the country's security, but officials are confident that threats by far right groups will not disturb the World Cup.

Police chief Bheki Cele told media last Friday that the extremists posed "absolutely" no threat to the World Cup.

Independent political analyst Daniel Silke told AFP that the outrage around Mr Terre'Blanche's murder does not translate into a terror threat for the World Cup.

"The South African government would have liked a more peaceful build-up to the World Cup," said Silke.

"The sensitivities within South Africa as a result of the death of Mr Terre'Blanche and the emergence of a frustrated white right-wing, on the fringes of the political scene, are very closely watched by South Africa's security authorities," he said.