By Staff Reporter| There are several reasons why controversial preacher, Uebert Angel’s recorded phone interview responses were openly broadcast at the weekend. ZimEye has legal cover and backing for the development, some of the reasons which are also at the bottom of this article.

Below is a short background:

Uebert Angel telephoned ZimEye.com on Friday afternoon for the first time in history, saying that he has never blocked interviews to him and never ordered for ZimEye journalists to be attacked by his bodyguards. He referred to an incident where ZimEye was blocked from interviewing him on the 18th June 2015 when we visited his church meeting at El Shaddai church in Birmingham, UK. There has been a hanging matter over complaints of abuse by women receiving services by him in his church. He attempted to sideswipe the matter saying he would like a family relationship meet up with someone he called “Mukwasha”, but would at the same time call him “Baba Mudiki”.

His telephone call on Friday just after 2pm came at a time when he is faced with a rising number of complaints over his moral conduct (as a Service Provider) towards church members, particularly women.

Now as ZimEye contends, that there is Prima Facie evidence that there are serious violations of human rights, and moreover bad conduct by a service provider (Uebert Angel himself), it behoved us to invoke the Public Interest and the Public Safety rights of citizens as accorded by both British and international laws and conventions.

• ‘Prima Facie’ evidence is the information that on the face of it, makes it evident, that the behaviour we are intending to capture secretly is either taking place already or is intended to take place. Without clear existing prima facie evidence ZimEye will not normally carry out secret recordings. Our guidelines are that the more serious the infringement of privacy in any secret recording, the stronger the prima facie evidence may need to be. In Angel’s case, the evidence backed by documents, IP traces, LIVE video recordings over several years, and more so, his own corroborations to the effect, is insurmountable.
• It is without question that Uebert Angel was asked for an interview and given the opportunity to take down questions for a later interview, upon which time, he chose to respond immediately via phone while the questions were being read out.
• He was also asked not to respond, but continued to reply to all questions save for one to do with identity fraud.
• Bullying and threats of violence. It is also without question that Uebert Angel did not deny bullying people who have questioned his conduct. Uebert Angel has for several years bullied people saying he is trained in martial arts. People at one of his meetings were also told that they will receive (eternal death) apocalyptic woes if they question him.
• Crime being committed. There is also the issue of crimes being committed, and there is evidence that Uebert Angel has and continued to cunningly coordinate criminal activities.
• There is also the issue that Uebert Angel has revealed that he has for over 3 years been deliberately avoiding either scrutiny or answering questions on his conduct and will only speak to favourable media.
• Lastly, there is the issue of women who complained that they have been abused. There is evidence to show that attempts have been made to suppress their citizenship rights of freedom of expression.
• For these reasons, ZimEye at the weekend began coordinating and encouraging victims to come forward with their cases, or approach their nearest law enforcement agencies for assistance.
• After Uebert Angel eventually disconnected his phone call at around 11pm, the preacher wrote back saying that he knew the call was an interview and he was no longer comfortable with the type of questions. SEE BELOW –
• Our practices are consistent with the law and industrially accepted journalistic practice and we endeavour to ensure that the subject or person to be secretly recorded should normally be the target of any investigation, for which there is prima facie evidence of wrongdoing or intended wrongdoing. Any attempt to secretly record people who are not involved in committing the behaviour under investigation will require a strong public interest justification – the ends should justify the means.