Zimbabwean millionaire couple want church return US$1m tithes

Zimbabwean millionaire couple, Mr Upenyu Mashangwa and his wife Blessing, want Prophet Emmanuel Makandiwa, the leader of United Family International Church (Ufic) Zimbabwe, to pay back a whopping US$1 million in tithes, offerings and other contributions they paid to the church.

XCLUSIVE MAGAZINE gathered from local media sources that the biff between the Zimbabwean millionaire couple and prophet Makandiwa, whose real name is Shingirai Chirume, started way back in July 2016 when the couple left UFIC and went back to their former church, Celebration church. Angered by the move, prophet Makandiwa wrote an article in The Herald on August 16, titled, “The importance of a good name.”

Part of the article reads: “When your name is tarnished you lose customers just because of a name that is not good. You need just one paper to write badly about you and say you are selling rotten chickens and that is the end of your career. You need one person who can move around telling people your perfumes can cause cancer and once that news begins to spread your company will begin to go down.”

This did not go down well with Zimbabwean millionaire couple who own Oceane Collection Perfumes. They claimed the message was targeted at them and Mrs Mashangwa runs a chicken business for her sister.

But what really broke the camel’s back was a post on 2 February 2017 in the Facebook page “The Truth About Prophet Emmanuel Makandiwa.” The post with titled ‘Truth Commission Part4” referred to five people who left Ufic church as those “who dine with the devil.”

The Zimbabwean millionaire couple was not going to take this “unprovoked” attacks any longer. On 7 February 2017, Mrs Mashangwa wrote to Prophet Makandiwa: “After serving you diligently for five years, the least I expect is for our end to be filled with this controversy and backlash. After seeing what was written on a page that so obvious it is administered by your office, I have had the time to reflect on my journey with you.

“I feel it’s about time you know; I feel you have robbed us, taken us for granted and afflicted pain on us. With all the commitment and love we had for you, you shouldn’t have betrayed us. It’s unfortunate those who are powerful believe they can oppress the weak. I believe in one principle of life which always stand; after all the good we did in Ufic, you can never repay good with evil and win.”

The Oceane Collection Perfumes owner then indicated that she wants her money back from the church. “I am only asking for my contributions because Makandiwa has proved that our relations have broken down,” said Mrs Mashangwa.

The Sunday Mail Society claimed it was “shown the Mashangwa couple’s receipts of their contributions to Ufic in which they were forking out at least US$24 000 per month in tithes, US$4 500 in ‘partnership with the Prophet’ and US$1 500 in charity contributions. Further, the couple also made ‘other’ payments to Ufic amounting to over US$100 000, for instance, on June 30, 2011 under Ufic receipt number 141009, the Mashangwa couple paid US$10 000 towards the purchase of the state-of-the-art public announcement (PA) system while on October 7, 2011 they paid US$15 000 towards ‘conference contributions’ recorded under Ufic receipt number 239656 and on December 4, 2011, the couple parted with 100 000 South African Rands in thanksgiving.”

Mr Mashangwa said the demand for a refund is not really about the money but to get even at a self prophesied enemy. “If it was all about the money on our part we could have asked to be paid back in July 2016 when we left the church but we only doing it now because Prophet Makandiwa and his people are fighting us. We are not broke because our businesses are doing well; we just want to cut ties and give each other his or her dues.”

We understand that a Ufic spokesman, Pastor Prime Kufa, who is also Prophet Makandiwa’s right handman, has written to Mrs Mashangwa promising to pay back her money if she produced receipts of her tithes, offerings and other contributions spanning between 2011 and 2016.

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