This is not merely a policy failure. It is a moral failure. It is a scandalous distortion of priorities.
UFIC For ED: Cry My Beloved Zimbabwe
- Minister Michael Mahendere praises the gesture by President Mnangagwa
- $2 Million for UFIC Church construction project
- A House for God, While God’s People Die
By Zvakwana Sweto
Last Sunday, something remarkable happened at the United Family International Church (UFIC) Basilica in Chitungwiza. As 30,000 congregants ululated, sang and danced, Prophet Emmanuel Makandiwa delivered news that would have been celebratory under different circumstances: President Emmerson Mnangagwa had pledged US$2 million towards the construction of a new 10,000-seater UFIC sanctuary in Harare.
The President, according to Makandiwa, instructed him to “start the work” and submit quotations for the required materials, promising to pay the US$2 million in his “own personal capacity”. This pledge, combined with Wicknell Chivayo’s US$1 million cash donation and gifts of three 2026 luxury vehicles, a Rolls-Royce Cullinan Black Badge, a Mercedes-AMG G63 G-Wagon, and a Mercedes-Maybach GLS 600, to the Makandiwas, has put the church’s expansion project at the centre of a national conversation.
Gospel musician and UFIC senior pastor Michael Mahendere has been quick to praise the gesture. In a message directed to the President, Mahendere expressed his “profound gratitude,” describing the contribution as “landmark and magnanimous,” a testament to “visionary leadership” and an investment in a nation “grounded in spiritual values”.
He went further, asking God to bless Mnangagwa for his generosity.
While Mahendere and the UFIC leadership celebrate, a far darker reality unfolds just a few kilometres away, in the crumbling wards of Zimbabwe’s public hospitals.
Zimbabwe’s healthcare system is at a “critical crossroads,” with public hospitals battling medicine shortages, ageing infrastructure, critical staff shortages, and rising patient costs.
Medicine availability at public health facilities currently averages just 47% against a minimum target of 50%. For chronic conditions such as hypertension, diabetes, and mental health disorders, the shortages are even more severe.
Minister Michael Mahendere
The situation is not one of occasional delays; it is one of permanent, institutionalized deprivation. Patients are routinely asked to bring their own syringes, paracetamol, and bandages to health centres.
Expectant mothers are given shopping lists of essentials they must supply on delivery day. Cancer and dialysis machines are broken down; essential drugs are in constant short supply.
Nurses and doctors are fleeing to countries like the United Kingdom due to poor remuneration.
Yet in the 2025 national budget, only 10.2% was allocated to health; well below the 15% Abuja Declaration target. The health budget is roughly US$800 million, or just US$50 per capita.
Meanwhile, US$2 million, a sum that could stock a major hospital with essential drugs for months, has been pledged for a single church building.
Prophet Makandiwa and wife receive luxury cars from Chivhayo
Does Mnangagwa Priorize Healthcare?
President Mnangagwa has framed the donation as support for a church that contributes to “nation-building”, while UFIC spokesperson Pastor Prime Kufakunesu; who was appointed to the Broadcasting Authority of Zimbabwe (BAZ) board by Mnangagwa last week said the gesture shows “joy and gratitude for what the First Family has done.”
But joy is a luxury the sick cannot afford. Gratitude is cold comfort to a mother watching her child die for lack of a simple painkiller.
Mahendere’s Complicity
As a gospel musician, Michael Mahendere has built a career singing about God’s love, mercy, and compassion. His songs have comforted the suffering, lifted the downtrodden, and reminded Zimbabweans of a higher purpose.
Yet when faced with a President who prioritizes a luxury church over dying patients, Mahendere chose not to speak for the voiceless.
He chose not to use his platform to ask: What about the hospitals? What about the mothers? What about the children?
Instead, he chose to praise. He praised the “visionary leadership” of a man whose administration has allowed the health system to collapse. He asked God to bless Mnangagwa, but did he ask God to bless the sick? Did he ask the President to redirect that US$2 million to Parirenyatwa, to Mpilo, to Sally Mugabe Hospital?
Mahendere’s support for this move raises serious questions about his love for people or is it love for money? As a gospel artist, he is called to be a voice for the marginalized, a defender of the vulnerable, a witness to truth.
When he aligns himself with power rather than with the powerless, when he celebrates lavish church construction while ignoring hospital devastation, he betrays the very gospel he sings about.
Zimbabweans are not asking for miracles. They are asking for the basics: medicines that work, hospitals that function, leaders who care. Instead, they get a President who builds churches while citizens die, and a gospel musician who sings his praises.
This is not merely a policy failure. It is a moral failure. It is a scandalous distortion of priorities.
Michael Mahendere, you have a platform and a voice. The question is: whose side are you really on?
