Banking giants, Stanbic Bank have redeemed their Gh¢3m (three million Ghana Cedis) pledge to the Black Stars World Cup Fund in support of the national team’s participation at the upcoming 2026 FIFA World Cup in USA/Mexico/Canada.
The donation is in response to the fundraising effort launched by President John Dramani Mahama in March to garner corporate and individual support for a targeted $30m to support Ghana’ campaign in North America where the Black Stars play Panama, England and Croatia in Group L.
Presenting the cheque to Deputy Finance Minister Thomas Nyarko Ampem at the Ministry of Finance in Accra yesterday, Stanbic Bank Chief Executive Kwamina Asomaning said their support is structured in two ways, a participation contribution to address more pressing needs, and an incentive portion to motivate and encourage the team to look beyond the first round and go all the way. Uniquely, the performance incentive package which is allocated all the way to the grand finale, will still be made available to be given to a charity of the Black Stars choosing in case they don’t get that far.
“We feel that structuring it this way strikes a very fine balance between providing for the immediate needs of the team and at the same time giving them an incentive to look beyond just showing up and strive for the top prize,” Mr Asomaning said.
“It’s a great pride for us to come together to support the Black Stars. As a bank, we have been inextricably linked to sports in Ghana. We have sponsored table tennis, armwrestling badminton tennis, hockey, basketball, swimming, the list goes on,” he noted.
“Soccer has not been left out so we are quite excited today to be in a position to contribute to our participation in this global event.”
The amount as usual has already been deposited into a dedicated World Cup account at the Bank of Ghana to ensure transparency and proper allocation toward the team’s preparations, with the World Cup now barely 34 days away.
Other donations received on Thursday were $500,000 from Newmont Ghana and Gh¢250,000 from OmniBSIC Bank, bringing the total donations received so far to GH¢17,181,500 and $2.5 million, following earlier contributions, including $2m and GH¢5 million tranches from Engineers & Planners and KGL Group.
“We are grateful for the response and as we’ve said already, we’ll meet here every Thursday to receive donations,” said Deputy Minister Ampem who is also Chairman of the Black Stars World Cup Fundraising Committee.
“We already have signals that a number of other banks and institutions are also coming. We are grateful, we thank you sincerely for responding to the national call to support our national team,” he added.
