Any chance that someone will put in USD3.5 billion in my bank account by mistake, please?

Umar Mukhtar

Fat chance. Unless I have crooked and stupid friends who control billions of dollars somewhere. Has to be premeditated, too. These things just don’t happen without prior planning.

First, there has to be someone ‘stupid’ inside to purposely write out the ‘wrong’ cheque in my favour and, second, there must be someone who can cover up the ‘mistake’ so that no one hears of it for as long as possible. I am prepared to share the loot, too.

I would need a puppet-master, someone who is pally-pally with people in high places and perhaps knows of their neediness and how to satisfy it in order to smoothen hiccups along the way.

Better still if I can indirectly share a bit of the loot such that if the shit hit the fan the blame is shared and not borne by me alone, and they would help me to cover it up for fear of being embarrassed themselves. No, I am being too imaginative; that happens only in movies.

Movies aside, the real world is hitting me hard. Donald Trump may get to be President of the United States, and ISIS is supposed to be on my side and committing atrocities in my name. So what else is new?

What would I do with all that money? First things first. I will open a secret offshore account, like thousands of my countrymen, in Panama or the British Virgin Island or the Cayman Islands.

Not that I don’t trust my country’s monetary system, after all even the chief regulator Central Bank’s governor’s family do it to protect their privacy. The ex-PMs’ families do it, too. Like me, we don’t need nosy questions, like how did I acquire that much wealth on my salary.

Then only I will feel free to spend my money. Fancy luxurious one-of-a-kind apartments in expensive cities worldwide and ranches bigger than some countries in faraway places, in other people’s names, of course. Wow, life is beautiful!

I don’t think I am that smart to deserve all these, but it’s just that people are so stupid. Their narrow-mindedness allows for so much manipulation before and after I swindle for my loot. Let them fight their silly little wars while my family dine at Nobu’s. It also helps that I am rich and feed them crumbs where appropriate.

All because I am a beneficiary of the ‘wrong’ cheque. But the reality is, it will never happen to me. It is my luck that I was not born into powerful families of public service to have all that opportunities at hand.

It is the best vocation that maybe I will urge my son to consider taking up public service and prosper. My late father was ignorant of all these. He actually bought the family bungalow at market price and I am still paying for it. Lucky thing it hasn’t got a swimming pool.

I am tired of writing about all these shenanigans. Maybe I’ll make a movie out of it. You think the recipient of the ‘wrong’ cheque will spare me the money to do that? I heard that he had done that before for a nature movie about stray animals on the street. If only he owes me some gratitude like he did with the last guy.