South Africa-based Zimbabwean social media troll, Tinashe Exevier Mutamiri, has apologised to United Family International Church (UFIC) leader Emmanuel Makandiwa for claiming he was killing people.
Mutamiri pulled down videos, which he had posted on social media attacking pastor Donald Mhandu and other pastors in Makandiwa’s church.
Mutamiri pulled down the videos following a directive by a South African court.
This was after Mhandu had approached the Gauteng High Court on November 9 seeking an interdict to bar Mutamiri from repeating the defamatory statements.
Through his lawyer Henk Horn, Mhandu successfully secured an order to compel Mutamiri to delete the defamatory posts, which accused the pastor of aiding Makandiwa to allegedly kill people opposed to his church.
In a video published online, Mutamiri said he did not apologise under duress.
He apologised to Mr Donald Mhandu “for all the information that I was made to publish on my account, for all the defamatory statements, I would like to retract it.” He added:
I would also like to extend my apologies to your father, prophet Emmanuel Makandiwa. You became collateral damage. All I published had no factual background.
Mutamiri also apologised to everyone he defamed on his Facebook account, claiming he was misled by faceless moles who eventually did not turn up to give their testimonies probably “because of fear that what they were saying was false.”
More: NewsDay Zimbabwe