Dear Pieter Engelbrecht,

Congratulations on taking home R7.2 million a month. I applaud your restraint. If I were the CEO of Shoprite and had the only keys to the safe, I’d take home a lot more. I’d also fill my car with free groceries every day and take those home too. Then again, you’re probably like me and get your edibles from Woolworths.

This time last year, you were earning 991 times more than your lowest-paid employee. How embarrassing. Hopefully, you have doubled this figure by now. It’s the only way to get the respect of your workers. I suppose you could always increase the disparity by reducing their salaries but they’d probably go on strike. Damn their selfish eyes.

Anyway. I’m looking for a job. Hold on. Don’t delete this just yet. You are going to want to hire me when you hear what I’m offering.

Your Checkers Sixty60 motorbike delivery department has been taking flack lately, largely because word got out that the riders earn a net monthly salary of R2 800. I agree this is outrageous. The exhiliration of riding a motorcycle every day should be compensation enough. In fact, tourists in Cape Town would jump at the chance of a free ride to see the city, even if they had to do it in under an hour and drop off groceries along the way.

I am proposing that you hire me to revamp the motorcycle unit. You will refer to me as Immortan Ben, Lord of the Citadel. My riders will be known as the War Boys and will wear studded leather jackets. Unfortunately the winged death’s head skull emblem has been taken by the Hells Angels but I will come up with something equally suitable. Maybe a dragon with the face of a dolphin and the tail of a scorpion.

You will need to replace your fleet. When I was growing up, my father bought me a second-hand delivery bike for Christmas. A Suzuki B120 with a red petrol tank. I think he wanted me dead. Even though I removed the baffles and rode it as hard and fast as I could, it was clear nobody on the road feared me.

This is why we will be riding the Ducati Desert X. At 937cc, this magnificent beast pushes out 110hp at 9 250rpm and 92nm of torque at 6 500rpm. These numbers will mean nothing to you since they aren’t attached to rand signs, so you’ll just have to trust me.

As you’ve probably heard before, size isn’t everything. My team will obviously need to acquire offensive driving skills. With this in mind, our bikes must be equipped with some form of weaponry. I suggest the M134 Minigun. Easily welded to the bike’s frame, it’s a six-barrel rotary machine gun capable of firing up to 6 000 rounds a minute. This should encourage the Volvo-driving soccer moms to move out of the fast lane.

My lawyer, Psycho Syd Taverner, a Harley-Davidson man, assures me this is all perfectly legal.

The Ducati Desert X also has a top speed of 272 km/h. This means your promise of delivering groceries within an hour can be reduced to 30 minutes. In some cases, with the help of the Minigun, it can be brought down to 15 minutes. Customers will have to pay an additional fee for this service.

Now, to business. I hear you are struggling to find South Africans willing to work for a pittance. Democracy has spoiled our people. Give them the vote and next thing you know, they’re demanding a living wage, lunch breaks and a free crash helmet. The entitlement of it all.

You only have 7 000 riders. The army has 70 000 men. We must begin a recruitment drive right away if we hope to take over the country … I beg you pardon, dominate the grocery delivery market.

I will begin rounding up the homeless and unemployed and keep them in cages until they understand that we are hiring them in their own best interests. Being an experienced motorcyclist, I will teach them to ride in the filthiest of weather conditions, Cape Town obviously excluded.

If they are not happy to simply ride with the wind in their hair and the rain in their face, in the glorious name of capitalism, I recommend we cast the net further. Are there still child soldiers in Sierra Leone? They might all be grown up by now. Pity. With the right incentives, you can get a 15-year-old to do anything. Just ask Donald Trump.

I’ll be at your offices first thing Monday. Have my contract and bike ready.

Your man on the back wheel,

Immortan Ben.