Prophetic Healing and Deliverance Ministries found and preacher Walter Magaya is a household name in Zimbabwe. Magaya commands crowds that would make any politician jealous and envious of the preacher. Walter Magaya’s crowds flock to him voluntarily without persuasion or coercion unlike political crowds who need motivation and persuasion to attend a rally. Magaya has enough numbers to swing votes to any particular side that he might desire, if he wanted to run for Political office Magaya would be a serious contender and tough opponent.
A man in Walter Magaya’s position does not get to that level without enemies, debts or people seeking to extort money from him. It is not a surprise to see Magaya in the papers and in the courts now and again, after all a Magaya headline is a crowd puller.
I put it to you dear reader that Magaya has powerful enemies who seek to destroy him and the very existence of PHD Ministries.
Magaya was at one time labelled a G40 Prophet because he attended functions and donated to the former first lady Dr. Amai Grace Mugabe. Several G40 aligned MPs and cabinet ministers attended Magaya’s church but so did Lacoste MPs and figures.
Magaya has gone through a lot of trouble under the new dispensation, it makes one wonder if it is the rule of law that they seek or personal scores being settled. Magaya has probably appeared in court more than any clergyman in the history of Zimbabwe. Court cases sprout like weeds in the Magaya field.
A number of the court cases that Magaya has gone through are yet to be decided.
In February 2019, Prophet Magaya made headlines when he announced AGUMA a drug which was said to cure or reduce the viral load in HIV patients. Prophet Magaya pleaded guilty and was convicted for contravening sections of the Medicines and Allied Substances Control Act through manufacturing and marketing an anti-HIV drug without first clearing with the regulatory authorities.
A month after that or so, in May 2019 to be precise Magaya was dragged to the High Court over failure to repay a Homelink loan amounting to US$23 million. It was a church loan but Magaya and his wife had served as the guarantors of the loan. That case was settled out of court, and we never heard anything from it, but Magaya’s name and reputation had already suffered severe bruises
In June 2019 Magaya was once again at the forefront of controversy, this time it was the taxman coming after Magaya. It is claimed that the courts ruled that evidence retrieved from computers seized from PHD church can be used as evidence in the church’s ongoing tax evasion trial. Magaya ‘s church PhD ministries is alleged to have prejudiced the taxman Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (Zimra) of over $28 million. From a $23 million court case to a $28 million case, clearly someone is out to bankrupt Magaya and leave him back in the gutters of Mhondoro where he was born.As if those multi million dollar legal battles were not enough in June 2019, one of the Magaya’s bodyguards, James Dzamu, was dragged to court for issuing death threats. This came after actress or is it former actress Charity Dhlodhlo claimed that Dzamu had told her that she might lose her life if she continued to drag the prophet’s name through the mud. Again another very serious allegation which has the potential of tanking Magaya and his ministries straight into oblivion.
Good news for Magaya though as the court held that the State had failed to prove its case and acquitted Dzamu.
Recently a string of videos surfaced with the parents of a woman, Mrs Chenai Agatha Maenzanise-Hassan, claiming that she had been manipulated, raped and impregnated by Magaya. Let’s face it rape is a serious crime with very serious consequences. In a wild and weird turn of events as synonymous with any Magaya case , the “victim” surfaced to clear Magaya’s name and ask for forgiveness. Clearly something fishy right there!
Magaya’s lawyer Admire Rubaya a very talented legal mind who ranks highly with the likes of the hawkish legal czar Rungano Mahuni, has been a very busy man. Rubaya is Magaya’s lawyer and has had his hands full with Magaya laundry. Lawyers are paid to do their jobs and it is not surprising if Rubaya walked away a few thousands richer. However what is really surprising and alarming is the acres of space that have been used in state media outlets against Magaya. Clearly well orchestrated hatch jobs have been featured in state media. Magaya doesn’t have a strong media or PR team and he has been losing the public relations battle especially on social media. There is no way that state media would run an orchestrated hatch job against such a figure without powerful political guns behind it.
Now Magaya becomes the first clergyman to be dragged before the Gender Commission, more of tax dollars and time being used in an anti Magaya crusade
Does Walter Magaya have a case to answer if victims are withdrawing and changing their stories?
Is someone or some people extorting money from Magaya through these cases and hurdles that Magaya has been jumping over?
Is Magaya innocent or is he a clever operator who knows how to cover his tracks?
Who stands to gain a lot from Magaya’s demise? The biggest question however is this one : Is Walter Magaya considering to run for public office??
Magaya has the numbers and the funds to run for public office, but with a criminal record and a handful of court cases he cannot focus his attention on any public office. I put it to you dear reader that maybe in all the Magaya hullabaloo someone somewhere has an axe to grind and that person really enjoys antagonizing Prophet Magaya. Magaya should beef up his media and PR team and fight back against these hatchet jobs lest his reputation suffers irreparable damage.
Nicholas Ncube Writer and blogger based in Canada
