Temba Mliswa calls for Uebert Angel’s arrest as shooting claims surface
Former Norton MP Temba Mliswa, who is also President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s cousin, has called for Presidential Envoy and Ambassador-at-Large Uebert Angel to be arrested over sexual assault allegations, escalating a public dispute that began after the preacher urged Zimbabweans to stop what he described as attacks on Vice-President Constantino Chiwenga.
A separate claim began circulating on social media on Friday, 6 November, alleging that Angel had escaped an armed attack in Shawasha in the early hours of the morning. Posts said 2 men emerged from bushes at about 2am and that a bullet struck a nearby water tank. Angel was reported to have escaped without injury.
The account has not been accompanied by a public statement from police or Angel’s representatives. Others are, however, alleging that the shooting claim is an engineered narrative with a hidden political agenda as the political turmoil is getting a bit too tense in the ruling party.
Meanwhile, Mliswa’s criticism followed a sermon Angel delivered at his Hippodrome ministry, where the preacher condemned what he called “vitriolic attacks” against Chiwenga. Angel said criticism of political leaders was legitimate, but drew a line at what he described as contempt.
“Criticism is legitimate. You should. You must. People criticise me. They criticise the President. They criticise the Vice-President. It’s allowed. But contempt masquerading as criticism is diabolic. It’s evil,” Angel told his congregation.
The sermon was delivered after a week of heightened public discussion about tensions within Zanu PF. At the party’s annual conference in Chinhoyi on 16 October, Chiwenga questioned whether the party was repeating mistakes that had led to the formation of the Second Republic.
“What led to the emergence of the Second Republic? It emerged from correcting the rot that was prevailing. Are we not repeating the same mistakes?” Chiwenga asked in his address. He called for a “brutal and honest self-appraisal” and said change should be driven by party members rather than imposed from above.
The conference adopted resolutions backing President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s continued leadership of the party until 2030 and his position as its sole presidential candidate for the 2029 congress. Chiwenga had previously opposed proposals to extend Mnangagwa’s tenure. His speech, along with the conference decisions, brought the succession debate into public view.
In a lengthy post titled “The False Prophet Who Became a Praetorian”, Mliswa accused Angel of applying a double standard by defending Chiwenga from criticism while, in Mliswa’s view, failing to address the Vice-President’s remarks about Mnangagwa and the party’s direction.
Mliswa challenged Angel’s distinction between criticism and contempt, asking who would decide when a citizen’s criticism became unacceptable. “That is not theology but censorship!” he wrote.
He also referred to biblical figures who challenged those in power, including Nathan confronting King David, Elijah condemning Ahab and John the Baptist criticising Herod. Mliswa argued that religious leaders should not encourage the public to stay silent when scrutinising political figures.
The former MP said Angel’s call for restraint should apply to all leaders, not only Chiwenga. In his post, he argued that the Vice-President had himself challenged the party’s direction at Chinhoyi and said the public should be free to discuss what happened there.
Mliswa also questioned Angel’s earlier prophetic remarks about an unnamed future successor. In July, Angel spoke of a person who was “walking, but dead inside” and said another person was “coming after August”. Mliswa argued that the predictions had not materialised and wrote: “A prophet whose prophecy fails does not get to reinvent failure as mystery but must be ignored.”
Angel did not name a successor in the remarks cited by Mliswa. The former MP used the comments to reinforce his broader criticism of religious figures entering political disputes. He called on churches to withdraw from succession politics and focus on preaching the Gospel.
The political dispute is only part of the reason Mliswa demanded Angel’s arrest. In March, a woman was reported to have filed a complaint of indecent sexual assault at Borrowdale Police Station. She alleged that the incident took place in Angel’s office at his Hippodrome church in March 2025.
The woman, described in the complaint report as a 40-year-old from Bulawayo, said she had attended a church service and was asked to meet Angel privately afterwards. She alleged that he later offered her US$1,000 in assistance from church tithes. As she prepared to leave, she said, he pushed her against a wall, lifted her dress and sexually assaulted her. She also alleged that he attempted to have intercourse with her, but stopped when she protested.
The account said the woman told a cousin, who later contacted Angel by telephone. It also said the matter was reported with help from a former associate of the preacher. At the time, police spokesperson Paul Nyathi said he was away from the office and could not comment. No detailed police statement was included in the report of the complaint.
Mliswa’s arrest call returned those allegations to public attention after Angel’s sermon. In his post, however, the former MP’s central argument concerned the preacher’s public intervention on Chiwenga and whether calls for respect were being applied consistently. He accused Angel of factionalism and suggested the sermon protected the preacher’s own access to political power.
Angel, in his sermon, rejected suggestions that his comments were driven by factional allegiance. He said he was not aligned with competing camps and urged Zimbabweans to support the country’s leadership rather than take part in what he called political drama.
The late-night shooting account added another strand to the attention surrounding Angel on Friday. The posts described an incident in the Shawasha area at about 2am, with 2 armed individuals coming from nearby bushes and a bullet striking a water tank. They said Angel was unharmed.
No further details about the alleged attackers, the circumstances of the reported shooting or any police investigation were made public in the initial posts. The claim emerged as Mliswa’s separate criticism continued to circulate, leaving Angel at the centre of 2 distinct stories: a political row over his comments on Chiwenga, and an unconfirmed report of an armed incident in Shawasha.