suppose I parachute into mainland Africa, could I help the people with my Hacker skills?
ihack4fun: i think the root of all problems/evil in africa comes from lack of (bad.. very bad!) leaders. there's mugabe on one extreme and many other mini-mugabes who are "sly" enough to go unnoticed (they are not sly or clever or whatever but just downright stupid!), and worst of all, potentially "good" leaders will simply never get to lead because of the long queue of bad leaders waiting to get to the top and make themselves rich - and who , believe me , are ready to do anything to make sure that the "good" ones never lead - including murder.
kenyan example - yet its not the worst
1. MPs in kenya , one of the poorest countries in the world, take home AT LEAST 8000$ per month (it must be 10000$ by now) , much more than most rich countries. they vote for these salaries and block the parliament activities (hold hostage) if they dont get the amount they wanted - after all they are the law makers !.
2. Before elections, several women who wanted to become MPs we're beaten , raped etc.. in order to scare them. 
3. Now , after elections, with the hard times and especially after a near civil war situation ( also because of "kenyan leaders greed for power" - that's another long story !) , 
MP revenue taxation was proposed ( i had forgotten to mention they are not taxed ) - they we're obviously up in arms against it and vowed it would never happen - even if they earn 1000 times more than the average kenyan, who pays taxes.
i believe african countries have their share of talent ( intellectuals, artists, good leaders .. all what you want) only that they never (and might never) get to exercise it.
many africans know this so they simply have no faith in govt and live like they dont have them - which is more or less true, this means living in some very chaotic societies where the strong survive and the rest are left to try and survive.
let me cut it for now but if you can hack the bad leaders and replace them with good ones - maybe that might just be the hack of the century :)