run away. For a thug, this is dishonourable behaviour. If a thug, or rather a group of thugs, wish to steal a car, they would probably do so in broad daylight, beat up the driver or even kill him or her and simply drive away with the stolen vehicle. In a recent incident, they drove away with two babies in the back seat who were later found thrown onto the side of the road, luckily still alive. The second main difference is that, unlike normal criminals, thugs perform political functions. Some thugs have been bred by the SSIS, which kept them on a tight leash but would let them loose on the regime's opponents, beating them up, destroying their vehicles, burning their homes. During elections, they would be sent to terrorise would-be voters for opposition candidates. In exchange, the police would turn a blind eye to their crimes against the people, normally the poor. If they crossed certain red lines, for example committing brutal murders or generally creating a bad smell around themselves, the police would mercilessly crack down on them, put them behind bars or simply shoot them down like mad dogs. With the vacuum created by the vanishing police force, the people formed popular committees to protect themselves and their property against increasing attacks by thugs and other criminals who made best use of the security vacuum. But this, among a number of other factors, almost brought the economy to a complete halt, with people choosing to stay