HARARE – Income statements retrieved from computers seized from prophet Walter Magaya’s Prophetic Healing and Deliverence Ministries (PHD) church can be used as evidence in a tax evasion trial, a Harare regional magistrate ruled on Tuesday.
The church is on trial for evading tax, allegedly prejudicing the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (Zimra) of over $28 million.
The church had disowned financial statements produced by prosecutors, leading to a trial within a trial to establish the validity of the unsigned papers.
Prosecutors allege the tax evasion took place between 2013 and 2018. The church, through its representative, Nelson Tawanda Marimo initially denied the allegations saying the money cited was tithes and offerings made by PHD congregants.
Later, Marimo disowned the financial statements before he accused Zimra official, Tinashe Madakadze, of concocting the documents.
Marimo through his lawyer, Oliver Marwa, objected to the tendering of the documents in court forcing the court to conduct a trial within a trial in order to establish how Zimra ended up with the financial statements.
Madakadze told court that Zimra made several efforts to get financial statements from PHD but the accounts officials were evasive.
He said this prompted Zimra to raid the church offices with support from 10 police officers.
“We seized computers which were locked with passwords. We requested Marimo to unlock the computers, but he sent two employees Tatenda Chinguwa and Winnie Matimati who helped us to access the statements,” he said.
“He (Marimo) wrote a letter authorising two employees to unlock the computers. I asked the two employees to authenticate the printed documents by stamping them but they refused saying Marimo was better placed to do that.”
Madakadze said Marimo refused to stamp the documents and instead wrote a letter accepting the figures on the financial statement.
The letter which Marimo wrote was tendered in court as an exhibit.
But the church insisted that the witness fabricated the financial statements.
“There is not even a date stamp to show that the accused accepted the financial statements and it’s possible that you may have created them on your own,” said Marwa.
The magistrate ruled that PHD’s application for the exclusion of the documents lacked merit. He would give full reasons for his ruling on June 14, he said.
The case was postponed June 27 for trial continuation.
PHD Ministries is facing charges of contravening the Value Added Tax Act.
Alternatively, the church’s representative is accused of breaching the Income Tax Act by failing to keep proper records, declare records and failure to uphold the Employees Act.
Prosecutors also say between 2013 and 2017, the church paid remuneration amounting to US$950,522.99 to Magaya’s wife, Tendai, through bank transfer into her personal Stanbic Bank account.
PHD also allegedly transferred remuneration of US$2 403,658 to Walter Magaya’s Stanbic bank account and on both occasions, PHD evaded tax by not paying PAYE (pay as you earn).
