21-year-old Paul Alfayo Wawire, a casual labourer in a sugarcane farm in Lugari has emerged the winner of the Kshs. 5 million Grand Prize in the first M-Shwari consumer promotion that was launched by Commercial Bank of Africa (CBA) and Safaricom on February 6th, 2014 to entrench a culture of savings among Kenyans.
“I did not even believe it when I was woken up from my afternoon nap by a call from Safaricom. I did not expect to win. All I was doing on M-Shwari is to save my wages for use in the event of an emergencyâ€, said Wawire, who stays with his grandparent’s home in Lugari.
Wawire who did not go to school beyond Standard 6, said he learnt of M-Shwari from his elder brother, who helped him sign up for the service shortly after its launch in 2012, and has been using it since
Wawire who has never been beyond his rural village, says he plans to invest the money in a piece of land where he can plant his own sugarcane and use some of the remaining amount to start a business to supplement his farming activities.
Over KES 30 million was up for grabs during the promotion period. Besides the KES 5 million grand prize, each week, one customer won KES 1 million and another 15 won KES 100,000 each. In addition, 100 randomly selected customers had their M-Shwari savings doubled daily.
During the awarding ceremony, Safaricom’s Chief Executive Officer, Bob Collymore said, “We introduced M-Shwari because we recognized that like Wawire, many Kenyans with a desire to save were falling through the system because they lacked a platform designed to meet them at their point of need. The ubiquity of the mobile phone, the simplicity of operating an M-Shwari account and the sense of dignity it accords the user have combined to make M-Shwari a revolutionary service with transformative capabilities.â€
CBA has vowed to support the 7 promotion winners of KES 1 million and above, by providing financial advice to ensure that they put the money into good use.