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About 30 Western Union customers of the Liberian Bank for Development & Investment (LBDI) and of other Western Union International agents operating in the Country emerged as winners of the bank’s final raffle draw. The draw was on Friday held at LBDI Duala Branch on Bushrod Island. Known as ‘Soccer Festival’, the draw was the final of a series of raffle draws held and also intended to get the last three winners who will join nine others to be sponsored by the bank and Western Union International to watch the final of the African Cup of Nations being held in Ghana.

 The last three winners are James Kollie of Barnesville, Rufus Zayzay of Monrovia and Sallu Kanu of West Point. LBDI and Western Union International are providing round-trip plane tickets, hotel accommodation, feeding, transportation, tickets and other benefits to 12 lucky winners of its raffle draw to watch the African Cup of Nations in Ghana. The first nine auspicious winners were declared at previous draws; therefore the last three lucky winners declared Friday have now filled the gap.

Mrs. Joetta Forkpa is the Officer-in-Charge of LBDI Western Union Service in Liberia. She said the last draw was the bank’s Western Union program called Soccer Festival where customers receiving or transferring money through the LBDI Western Union Service would win different prices through raffle draw.

Mrs. Forkpa disclosed that apart from the soccer festival, customers can also win face caps, T-Shirt, digital cameras made particularly for the Nations Cup as well as other prizes.

She pointed out that her Western union customers had shown excitement about all of the bank’s programs especially the soccer festival curriculum. “We usually run different programs during the year,” she noted, adding, “we had the end of the draw for December and we had the Independence Day program for July.”

Mrs. Forkpa also disclosed that the bank’s Western Union service also carried out back-to-school event in August and September last year.

Touching on the impact of the Western Union service on the bank’s performance, she said the service was immensely contributing positively toward the growth of LBDI. Over the years, the LBDI has offered this service and it has raised the bank’s performance, she added.

As the matter of fact, she said, most of the bank’s Western Union customers had opened and were managing different accounts with LBDI including savings and other accounts.

“Some of our major requirements for payment at our locations,” Mrs. Forkpa stated, “are that our customers have to make available tangible Identification cards. Among the identification cards are passport, drivers’ license, national identification card, voter registration card, working card and the LBDI passbook.”

She indicated that the Western Union service at the bank is safe, secure, reliable and faster worldwide and called on the general public to take advantage of the service. “we can definitely promise them that whenever they do business with LBDI Western Union, their money will get to the intended persons,” she stressed.

An important service, Mrs. Forkpa stressed, that Western Union was working closely to reduce service charge intra-country transfer. She, however, said that the service charge for that program remained the same until the decision was reached for its reduction.

Also speaking was the Officer-in-Charge of LBDI Duala Community Branch, Rhodell M. Tarpeh. She said that the Western Union service in the community had gained momentum. "It was a logical step on behalf of the bank to open a branch in Duala, Bushrod Island. “This is very important in our drives to take banking to the people,” she said, describing the decision as timely and worthwhile.