Kangsen Feka Wakai
We are a global multi-service agency seeking highly skilled, motivated—with emphasis on ‘motivated’— and peripatetic individuals who can embark on the comfort induced, guilt cleansing, feel-good, but nevertheless pompous task of saving and illuminating a massive chunk of real estate with excess resources and not enough commonsense for its own good.
We are an equal opportunity employer and will not hire individuals based on a candidate's race, age, sexual orientation, profession, gender, hair length or national origins: so it makes little difference if you are from Leopold's Belgium, Biya's Cameroon, Obama's America or Delamare's Kenya. Charitable people of the world, you are encouraged to apply.
Applicants for this position must also exhibit a keen interest in all things depraved and exotic, but above all must demonstrate willingness to aid, save, rescue, illuminate, adopt and enlighten the mute denizens that Son Excellence Monsieur Nico Sarkozy refers to as:
“…all the Africans who are so different, one from the other, who don’t have the same language, who don’t have the same religion, who don’t have the same customs, who don’t have the same culture, who don’t have the same history and yet recognize the other as being African.”
Thus an understanding of the neoliberal principles and system that inform and instruct the seemingly interminable cycle of aid and development is required. An appreciation of is encouraged. This agency recommends that each prospective candidate is familiar with Smith's Wealth of Nations and Dawkins's Selfish Gene.
But, the applicant must also exhibit a profound appreciation for NGOs and other post-modern missionary movements cloaked in self-righteous garbs with smiles and hope to share. We will not consider candidate's who want to build partnerships. These people need to be led!
We require that the ideal candidate be a gorilla lover and photogenic—and that is non-negotiable! We have committed ourselves to take at least eighteen hundred and ninety eight photos of these cute primate cousins of ours with you.
However, applicants are advised to always display humility, and refrain from being overtly patronizing—remember your subjects can exhibit an otherworldly cynicism.
Even as you go about the awesome task of bringing smiles; be warned you might encounter horrors of Hollywood proportions: yoga exercises and frequent meditation is recommended as an antidote to the stress and melancholy you might encounter as you go about your awesome task. .Trust us on this one; you will be confronting a continent 'for the taking'.
Thus, we recommend that applicants should own at least three U2 albums—for the record, this agency prefers Joshua tree, read at least two Bob Geldoff essays on the corruptibility of African Big Men and the helplessness of its people. A reading of Michela Wrong’s books will not hurt either.
And, if applicant has a creative background, we recommend that the said individual develop events and concepts [concerts and black-tie banquets a la African Synergy] that can raise the most funds and pity in partnership with transnational corporations. These events, preferably cultural sensitive, must entertain whilst raising funds to save lives in post-colonial constructs trying too hard, but to no avail, to be nations.
Hence, musicians are encouraged to compose catchy melodies that celebrate our common humanity; a song with the heart of 'We are the World' and the soul of Bob Marley's 'One Love.'
We wholeheartedly discourage the listening of provocateurs and discontents. We disallow the likes Fela, Peter Tosh, select Bob Marley songs, lapiro de Mbanga, Dead Prez, and Lagbaja amongst others whose biased lyrics might distract you from the task at hand. Any of such recordings found in an applicants possession or Ipod will immediately disqualify the candidate from this life-altering opportunity.
Meanwhile, poets, writers, reporters, but most especially playwrights must demonstrate an ability to tell ‘authentic’ African stories, universal ones, that convey the horrors that is a characteristic of the African experience; compelling narratives of rapes, mutilations, corruption, whore houses and child soldiers. We prefer the kind of stories that would make talk show hosts and pundits gasp.
We will alert other agencies if a candidate is suspected of having read, or worse agree with the arguments raised by Dambisa Moyo and Niall Ferguson in Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not working and How There Is a Better Way for Africa.
This agency will not tolerate applicants who cite or quote Achebe, Beti, Ngugi, Walter Rodney, Cheikh Anta Diop, Sankara, Nkrumah, and Nyerere. Such candidates will be escorted out of the interview and our premises by armed Wackenhut guards.
Finally, as a rule of thumb, applicants must learn to shun any notion that anyone but Africans is responsible for their current circumstance, but don’t forget to remind them that ‘we are all African’ after all.
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