(This is the Online column, written for The Southland Times)
Oh, I feel so special.
Just last week I received an e-mail from my new best friend, Tony Night.
Mr Night is a manager at a prestigious London bank and has contacted me via e-mail. He told me a tale of woe about Edward Sams, a consultant with the South African Mining Corporation.
It seems Mr Sams made a 12-month fixed deposit of 11.5 million then promptly up and died.
With no will and no next of kin, poor man.
Sadly, because no one will ever come forward to claim this money, in five years it will revert to the ownership of the Pommy government. Well, so my new best friend Mr Night tells me anyway.
Now you might wonder what any of this has to do with me. I certainly wondered.
As it turns out, my new best friend Mr Night is offering me the opportunity of a lifetime. If I help him out with access to an offshore bank account, he’s willing to let me pose as the long-lost next of kin of poor Mr Sams and will split the loot with me. Just like all those nice Nigerians who keep e-mailing me.
Oh, and then there was the e-mail just before Christmas from Yasser Arafat’s poor, grieving widow. She needed help accessing the family funds and just like my new best friend Mr Night, Mrs Arafat wasn’t going to be greedy about it. In fact, she offered me 40 percent of her late husband’s estate.
Oh yes, I feel special.
I replied to Mrs Arafat’s e-mail but she never got back to me. Still grieving, I suppose.
As for those nice Nigerian lads who have been in contact with me, I replied to their offers as well but with limited success. In March, that nice Mr Zambuki I was corresponding with seemed to just drop off the face of the Earth.
Coincidentally, around the same time I was also exchanging e-mails with a Mr Mbuki, also from Nigeria. However, I haven’t heard from him since I asked if he could slip me $5 to pay for a new rubber band for the generator I use to run my computer.
Oh well, I’ve replied to my new best friend Mr Night and hopefully, some time very soon, I’ll be a millionaire — but don’t tell anyone, it’s highly confidential. Just between you, me and my new best friend Mr Night.