The Fiji Red Cross Society is urging Fijians to be aware of impersonators who have over the years used the national appeal platform to pocket money.

Director General Filipe Nainoca says there’s been instances where people have been tricked into donating money intended for a good cause.

Nainoca says with the national appeal now underway, their volunteers from all sixteen districts will be wearing Red Cross emblems and the cans have been numbered.

“ In the past years, we’ve had people who managed to get hold of Red Cross cans and shake them in place that we don’t normally shake cans in. Once we get reports of these, we try and identify the person but we’ve worked very hard to cut this practice. So that’s the reason why we have introduced these vests to enable the person to be identified as a Red Cross volunteer.”

He adds that 400 cans have been distributed to all their officers with a target of $30,000 to be collected from the appeal.

Meanwhile, an average of 300 volunteers will be out in towns and cities collecting contributions from the public till the 29th of this month.