The paper seeks to analyse efforts undertaken by the Brazilian administration since 2003 to create a strengthened relationship with Africa with development cooperation at its core. It examines discursive strategies implemented by President Lula da Silva and, to a lesser extent, his successor President Dilma Rousseff, to reconceptualise the donor-recipient relationship ingrained in this kind of cooperation. Brazilian efforts to change existing imaginaries of paternalistic donors and submissive recipients engaged in a neo-colonial relationship to images of equal partners engaged in a mutually beneficiary relation will be analysed by applying the theoretical concept of role and gift theory to a content analysis of presidential speeches delivered during official visits to African states.