Porridge man wins Sh8 million house through M-Pesa

Joseph Kung’u Wanjiku, the man who won the six apartment in the Safaricom M-Pesa Tu promotion, has a weird addiction: porridge! In fact, when the Safaricom call came in, he was about to take his fovourite ‘syrup’.

“I remember on the day I received a call that I had won a house, I was at home about to warm some porridge, watching some motivational video,” he told Business Today. “At first, I thought the call was about my phone bill that was due.”

The 33-year-old father of three girls  from Riruta, Dagoretti, becomes the new homeowner of an apartment valued at Ksh7.8 million located in Nairobi’s Kahawa West estate. He works as a clearing & forwarding agent and a small-scale farmer in Gatundu.

Kung’u also takes care of an orphaned girl, who is currently pursuing higher education at Kiriri Women’s University of Science and Technology.

READ ALSO: WHY POOR PEOPLE ALWAYS WIN PROMOTIONS

He said uses M-PESA to pay for his bills for both business purposes and personal use. This includes paying for KRA customs services, drivers’ services at the port, family upkeep and school fees for his children.

The winners of the first five apartments include Juma Saidi, a maintenance manager in a Cement Company from Coast; Benson Kilonzi, a jua kali artisan from Kitui; Jeniffer Kathure, a Khat trader from Meru; James Njagi, a metal artisan at Gikomba market and Eric Lindenberg, an interior designer who is a resident of Nairobi.

In addition to the six apartments, more than 490,000 M-PESA customers and over 5,000 agents have won instant prizes including cash and float amounts of Ksh2,000, Ksh5,000 and Ksh10,000.

SEE: DP RUTO ON THE SPOT OVER WESTON LINK TO BEACH HOTEL

“Through this promotion, we have seen the diversity of M-PESA through the variety of customers from all walks of life.” said Paul Kasimu, Director of Resources, Safaricom.

The promotion seeks to reward the over 28.6 million M-PESA’s customers and 150,000 agents with Ksh300 million in prizes. Seven lucky customers and eight lucky agents stand to win an apartment and Ksh1 million in float respectively.