Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe wanted to do something similar for Kirsty Coventry, but in that nation's tradition of government shadiness, he just gave her a briefcase full of cash.
Forutunately for her, it was US dollars.
In 1980, $100,000 US = $ 147,000 Zimbabwe dollars.
Today, $100k US Dollars(and this isn't a joke) = $75,853,000,000,000,000 Zimbabwe dollars. Of course, with the current Zimbabwe inflation rate of 11,250,000% (also not a joke), that $100k is worth a lot more by the time you've read this sentence.
Mugabe hands Olympic medalist $100,000 cash reward - Yahoo! News
Zimbabwean dollar - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
There's a lesson here for the political thread too....