Mars probe inspires ANC

Following the successful NASA Curiosity rover mission to Mars, The African National Congress Aeronautical Space Association has this morning announced their latest plans: to send textbooks to Limpopo schools.

"We know it's a massive undertaking, but we're confident that it is at least possible," says Organisation CEO Sir Vis Deliverie. "I mean, they sent a vehicle to a dusty, abandoned area that is untouched and not cared about by demagogical hot-air-blowing politicians, so it's basically the same thing."

Deliverie has been hard at work. "Ever since my brother-in-law's cousin got me this job, I've been working hard to get it on track. Surely we can do better than those bloody agent Imperialists with their successful tendencies?" he said.

The ANCASA has, however, criticised the recent NASA mission as "simplistic and overblown", stating that it faced barely any problems from its inception.
"They only had some little duststorm to deal with: try getting your NASA probe to get past Angie Motshekga and Blade Nzimande to land in a Limpopo school with textbooks. Besides, there are no potholes or rivers in space,"said Deliverie.

The project is already steadily underway, and has received its intially primary pre-adjustment budget. "We've recieved that first pre-funding-cut lump sum, and have yet to receive the funding adjustment before the Department of Kick-backs demands its obligatory 20% cut. We also saved quite a bit of money by avoiding the tender process and getting a super-cheap supplier," said Head of Tender Allocations, Givemore Kickbacks.

The NASA rover touched down precisely in place last night and immediately transmitted photos from the Gale Crater. The project cost roughly $2.5 billion, covering the 345-million-mile voyage from earth in just 254 days. These facts bode well for the ANCASA project, says Deliverie.
"Given that the distance between the bookstore and the school is about 10 miles, roughly 0.000000005797% of the distance, our proposed mission has at least a 20% chance of success.
Which is about 25% more than previous attempts," he said.

The NASA Curiosty probe is also armed with a myriad sensors to determine whether or not there is any life or activity on the red planet's surface, a fact that has excited the ANCASA.
"It has given us the idea to make a much smaller probe and send it into politicians' brains. That way, we could find out if there is anything going on in there."

However, the agency knows the difficulty of the task at hand.
"We already know the possible fallout if this project were to fail," said the Association's Head of Passing the Buck, Blama Notherguy. "As such, we have even prepared our defence in the probable unlikely event that we fail. Possible people to blame will be other politicians, the rocket's contractors, and Hendrik Verwoede."