After reading a report in the The Times this morning I did something I never thought I would have to do; I immediately decided to send a stern warning to my two daughters in England reminding them they find themselves in an authoritarian country, where freedom of expression is severely curtailed, and law enforcement appears to be deployed to punish anyone who dissents from the prevailing political wisdom in a fashion that bears chilling similarity to a police-state.

I feel they are especially vulnerable because both of them grew up in southern Africa around people, both black and white, who like to laugh; very often at themselves, but with people who prefer not to take themselves, or life generally, too seriously. They are both prone to the sort of youthful exuberance that now appears to be off limits in the land of their birth.

So it was, I read with shock that in the UK, the police are arresting more than 12,000 people each year, for ‘words that cause offence’; an average of 30 arrests per day.

Some examples:

• A man sentenced to eight weeks in jail for posting three memes on Facebook that were considered ‘grossly offensive’. The most objectionable of the memes depicted a group of knife-wielding immigrants with the caption ‘Coming to a town near you’.

• A teenager imprisoned for three months for posting offensive jokes on Facebook. He had apparently been drunk at the time, and the material had been copied from the website ‘Sickipedia’.

• Former footballer Paul Gascoigne was found guilty in a criminal court of racially aggravated abuse, after a joke he made during a stop on his An Evening with Gazza tour at Wolverhampton Civic Hall. At one point during the show, he had turned to Errol Rowe, a black security guard, and said, “Can you smile please, because I can’t see you”. For this, Gascoigne was fined £1,000 and forced to pay a further £1,000 in compensation to Rowe.

• Last year, Lucy Connolly, the wife of a Conservative councillor, was sentenced to 31 months in prison after an offensive tweet about burning hotels housing asylum seekers in the wake of the Southport slaying of three little girls. Furious at the time, she removed the post four hours later, but this meant little to the court. She has been eligible for release on temporary licence since last November but her appeal to be allowed to spend time with her traumatised 12-year-old daughter, and her sick husband suffering from bone-marrow cancer has been refused.

• At the insistence of then Director of Public Prosecutions Keir Starmer, a man was convicted after a joke tweet about blowing up an airport after it had closed due to a snowfall.

• A preacher convicted of harassment for the crime of ‘misgendering’ after referring to a trans-identified male as a ‘gentleman’.

• An army veteran was arrested and handcuffed for ‘causing anxiety’ by posting an image of four ‘Progress Pride’ flags arranged into a swastika.

• A former Royal Marine, Jamie Michael posted a video online which criticised illegal migration and called for peaceful protest. He was arrested and charged and later found not guilty in court.

Having read this I had a panic attack and thought heaven forbid, but my girls could quite easily say or post something deemed ‘offensive’ on the spur of the moment or in a frivolous moment among close friends, and find themselves in the sort of trouble that could ruin their lives. And then, once ‘fingered’ by a system like this, the fact that they are both very kind, decent, caring, compassionate girls would matter little (both girls have worked unpaid in African orphanages); they would be branded and banished to the margins of society.

Reading this report, it is very difficult to disagree with Elon Musk comparing modern Britain to the Soviet Union, and US Vice-President J D Vance’s claim that in Britain and Europe, “freedom of speech is in retreat”, and “fundamental values” are no longer shared with the Americans. “You do not have shared values,” he said, “if you’re so afraid of your own people that you silence them and shut them up”.

In the midst of my deep dismay I reflected on life in Africa where poor governance and various forms of chaos generally prevail, but looked at the blue sky, the Zambezi River, savoured the quietude, and reminded myself, I have much to be grateful for.

Compared to the over-regulation, the myriad laws, the vindictiveness of the mainstream media, and the zeal of the all-powerful ‘thought-police’ in Britain, maybe mild mayhem and some misrule provides for a more agreeable way of life.  Ironically, maybe we here, almost by mistake, are ‘freer’ than our British and European ‘cousins’. And what I love about Africans in general, and black Africans in particular, is their wonderful sense of humour, and their ability not to take themselves too seriously; we still know how to laugh here on the ‘Dark Continent’ and don’t have to worry about being locked up for doing it. And the icing on the cake; really good beer is less than a Pound a pint.

I’m writing to the girls to tell them to think about coming back home.