By Investigative Reporter | PART1: When Professor Welshman Ncube’s political faction initiated its first split in 2005, it struggled to gain legislative support. However, 19 years later, the faction has amassed substantial funds, enabling it to influence Nelson Chamisa’s MPs against him. The source of these funds is controversial, as it is not linked to ZANU PF. The faction has accumulated a $25 million fortune from exploiting Ndebele women through a land scam, orchestrated by Professor Ncube’s official diaspora blogger, Jimmy Chasafara (Ndaba Nhuku), who promised non-existent lands, ZimEye can reveal.
This scam, which Professor Ncube cannot deny knowledge of, was initiated in the events after a meeting on December 15, 2013, by his publicist, Ndaba Nhuku. The program, known as Qoki, claims to be represented by Professor Ncube personally as of March 2024. Both Chasafara (Hatfield) and Sithule Tshuma (Manchester based) have been implicated in the scam, which the Zimbabwean government has labelled a fraud.
The origins of this scheme trace back to the burial of Nelson Mandela, during a function in Sheffield, UK, where the faction sought media support from the ZimEye news network so to compete against the Morgan Tsvangirai/Nelson Chamisa-aligned publicist, Baba Jukwa.
Since 2014, Professor Ncube received significant media coverage from the political media campaign facility, which was quickly branded Qoki in 2017. This program was presented to women as a means to empower the regional population. A decade later, these 550 women have lost an average of $45,000 each, all totalling a $25 million lumpsum, to fraudulent activities involving fake title deeds and false promises. Although some refunds have been issued over the last two years, the majority of the funds remain unaccounted for, leaving the women substantially impoverished.
The situation for these women worsened when they were deceived multiple times by Professor Ncube, whose law firm offered assistance while simultaneously representing the scam’s key figures, Ndaba Nhuku and Sithule Tshuma. This situation underscores the complex layers of involvement, highlighting Professor Welshman Ncube’s inextricable connection to the scam.
ZimEye has multiple recordings, and documented paper trail to show Prof Ncube himself working with the Qoki founder.
-Where is the USD25million Prof Welshman?
-And why are you tripple-dipping Ndebele women?
PROF WELSHMAN NCUBE MUST DENY HIS BENEFIT FROM JIMMY CHASAFARA’S QOKI SCAM.
PART TRANSCRIPT OF MARCH 2023 INTERVIEW:
NN: I am saying you and I if we come together and we say we want to buy land 50/50 shares. We say we’ve bought land and want to put roads… we have bought a farm right? We have bought Umguza farm, we now want 50 houses which we will later sell, and then one says I am pulling out I cam no longer proceed. So, who is going to do the other 50, after I’ve been left alone. Because after I am left alone I’m a longer have resources you were putting in. It means everything has collapsed.
If things have not collapsed I need to get someone to buy your 50% so that we continue with business. So most of these people who come to you are people who have decided not to continue. You decide to not to continue, you will have to sell your property your shares isn’t it? To sell your shares. And if there’s no one wanting to buy, it means that everyone stops working because there’s no one to fund your shares your portion of the money. So it’s not as straightforward as people were coming with bank statement and that because when you are buying you pay. Your bank statements are going to be there because you are buying. I buy using groups and when I do that it means that my bank statements are going to be there, isn’t it? And if I run a loss I run a lot and if I decided to pull out it means that my bank statements are going to be there- I’ve pulled out with or without economy (sic) and the other thing is Zimbabweans all the time why do they love drama when they are leaving something?
SC: when they are leaving leaving as in abandoning?
NN: Yes, when they are leaving, they DON’T WANT TO TAKE OWNERSHIP, TO SAY THEY HAVE FAILED. They always to blame someone. And even in a relationship when a girl no longer once you she will look for something to say and blame, to say, aaah, I don’t want you because of this and that. The lad blames the other person. But why not just say we have grown out of love? To simply say that I am going out because I no longer have money to continue paying the things required to process this land.
And I always say when you buy land, you are not just buying shares, you are buying collecting effort. You shall construct roads, the sewage, you Sall do surveying. So in the process of all that, WHEN THEY FEEL THAT IT’S TOO EXHAUSTIVE they don’t have resources to continue paying… that today there is money for sewage tomorrow there is this and that; because council will only give hou title deeds after the land has been surveyed, the roads are now there, that’s when the council gives you individual title deeds, people need to know.all those things, but Zimbabweans being Zimbabweans they love to acquire property without understanding the fundamentals.
“… so all the people who go to Qoki they opt in as individuals, they are not forced. There is no coercion, like in a church. You are asked you want to buy land, you want to buy land, you are told, this is what is available guys. Do you want to join? They join on their own.
In land there, there will be 10. 10 women. They won’t be many people.
So it’s not as straight forward as people who come to you complaining, whether they are 100 or what. They just want to use you, if they use you fair and fine. And then people like me will come and defend Sithule.
Because, Qoki, I founded it, and I know the principles behind Qoki I am the founder of them, just like I told Ezra. Qoki is my baby, when I defend it I defend it knowing what is happening inside it, and knowing what. My own sister I told her don’t buy this kind of land. Go and buy your own land individually, because this land takes long to divide, the council wants you to meet certain requirements and its exhausting for an individual to make it. AND ALL THOSE PEOPLE WERE TOLD, that we shall do this, do this, but they like paying small amounts, yes small amounts comes with so many tags, it becomes exhausting, for people who don’t have resources who work. So in a nutshell this is what happens with land bought by groups…”