Accra, March 14, GNA - The management of areeba, Ghana's largest mobile phone network, on Tuesday launched a Special World Cup Promotion to sponsor 200 areeba customers to an all expense paid trip to Germany to cheer the Senior National team, Black Stars at the 2006 World Cup in June. A statement issued in Accra said the promotion would cover all areeba customers and winners would benefit from the package that comprise a return air tickets, accommodation, medical and life insurance, 200 Euros pocket money and transportation to and from matches.

"This is areeba's way of celebrating Ghana's unprecedented achievement of qualifying for a World Cup and we thought it best to involve the fans," the statement quoted Mr Haitham Maged, Marketing Director of areeba. It said new prepaid subscribers were required to buy regular starter packs for 40,000 cedis and 15,000 cedis for the instalment pack, and then text "Ghana" to the short code 1372 to enter the draw that would be held fortnightly. The statement said existing subscribers using the prepaid service would have to recharge regularly whilst post-paid subscribers would have to ensure that their subscriptions remained active during the promotion period to qualify for the draws.

"Fixed Wireless Application Phone (FWAP) operators, popularly known as "areeba to areeba" also stand the chance of winning by regularly recharging their accounts during the period," the statement said. It said the first draw of the promotion would be held on Friday March 31. This is the second time areeba, official telecommunications sponsor of the Black Stars would be sponsoring fans to a major soccer tournament. The company recently sponsored 100 soccer fans, mainly areeba customers to support the team during CAN 2006 last January, held in Egypt.