News / Local
'Love for women got me behind bars'
15 Oct 2021 at 06:28hrs | Views
BIGGIE DUBE, a pastor at the Church of Christ, has finally broken his silence after being sentenced to 31 years in prison for raping some of his female congregants in Bikita.
Pastor Dube, as he was popularly known, was reported to have taken advantage of unsuspecting female congregants who had approached his office in need of assistance.
B-Metro visited Dube at Khami Maximum Prison to find out, what really transpired leading to his conviction.
"When I was ordained to be a pastor under Church of Christ, I was already a married man, but the major challenge that I discovered about myself was that I was not satisfied with the woman that I had married.
So, this forced me to have a multitude of girlfriends in and outside church.
"In church, I took advantage of those ladies who would come to me for counselling and most of these ladies were vulnerable as they were having problems with their marriages.
"I remember that within a short space of six months I had managed to bed almost half of the female population that was in my church," he said.
Dube said things later went out of control when one of the ladies that he was dating in Bikita discovered that she was pregnant.
The lady told the pastor about the pregnancy, but in response, the man of the cloth denied responsibility and this did not go down well with the lady.
"From the relationships that I had with the female congregants from my church, I made it a point that I slept with almost all of them and from that habit, I impregnated one of the ladies, who later let the cat out of the sack.
"The lady, out of stress, shared her issue with other female congregants and by so doing she alerted other ladies, who I was also dating that I had a number of girlfriends within the same church," he said.
The man of the cloth said from these confessions, two female congregants later sat down and hatched a plan to press charges of rape as a way of fixing him as he had wasted their time.
The issue was reported to the police and he was arrested.
"When I was picked up by the police, my superiors at church were notified about the issue and during that time a lot of women were forthcoming to report that I had raped them. I realised then that my future was doomed.
"A docket was prepared and at first it had five counts of rape from two women and from the investigations by the police, they decided to remain with one woman, who was alleging that I had sexually assaulted her twice," he said.
Dube was found guilty of having raped one of the congregants, who had approached him in serious need of counselling as she was having problems with her husband.
The magistrate was convinced by the prosecutor that although Dube and the woman were having an affair, Dube had at one time raped her, resulting in her falling pregnant.
"I told the magistrate that the woman in question was actually my girlfriend for more than two years and we had been sleeping together since then.
The magistrate said she had nothing against their relationship, but on the day in question the complainant never consented to sleeping with him.
"When I heard that statement coming from the magistrate that is when I realised that I was in serious trouble and from the trial it was agreed that I should be imprisoned for 31 years as I was very dangerous to be in the streets," he said.
Soon after the judgment he was moved to holding cells, awaiting his movement to a prison that houses "D" class inmates.
"Soon after being convicted, I was moved to Mutimurefu Prison and when I got there, I never thought I was going to make it as I had a lot of issues on my mind as my wife had already abandoned me during my trial.
"From that judgment I told myself that prison was going to be a place where I would start a new life considering that I had wronged society by taking advantage of the congregants, who approached me in serious need of my services, but I took that situation to my advantage by using those women to quench my sexual appetite," he said.
The inmate said soon after admission to Mutimurefu Prison, he went for an HIV test and discovered that he was HIV positive.
"When I got to prison, I discovered that my health was deteriorating very fast so I was urged to go for an HIV test and it was discovered that I was actually positive.
A lot of inmates by then were actually afraid of getting tested, so this forced me to come up with a concept called Khami Opportunistic Infections Organisation (KOICO)
"This group was created to try and educate other inmates to go for testing so that they could start their medication on time to avoid unnecessary loss of life,"he said.
Dube said from his stay in prison, he had discovered that crime does not pay, instead he lost people who were instrumental in his life as they could not stand the fact that he had turned into a rapist.
"21 years in prison my brother is not a joke and on this long journey I can tell you that I never gained anything except being abandoned by people who once loved me. With that in mind my brother I would like to tell my other friends out there to stay away from crime.
"At the moment I am left with nine years to go before I can complete this journey. I am only happy because I am on treatment and I have turned to be an Aids activist educating other inmates on the dangers of taking advantage of women," he said.
Dube said at the moment they were working on programmes that encourage inmates to be vaccinated against Covid-19 in prison as a lot of inmates did not understand the motive behind their vaccination against the disease.
"At the moment I am working with three guys as we try to educate inmates on the Covid-19 virus and the importance of them being vaccinated to avoid the spread of this disease. As we speak as the team that is spreading the message of Covid-19 we were vaccinated twice.
"We did this for the other inmates to really believe that this vaccine was meant to save lives and not to kill people.
From the time we started this awareness campaign I am happy to tell you that a lot of inmates have been forthcoming for vaccination," he said.
Pastor Dube, as he was popularly known, was reported to have taken advantage of unsuspecting female congregants who had approached his office in need of assistance.
B-Metro visited Dube at Khami Maximum Prison to find out, what really transpired leading to his conviction.
"When I was ordained to be a pastor under Church of Christ, I was already a married man, but the major challenge that I discovered about myself was that I was not satisfied with the woman that I had married.
So, this forced me to have a multitude of girlfriends in and outside church.
"In church, I took advantage of those ladies who would come to me for counselling and most of these ladies were vulnerable as they were having problems with their marriages.
"I remember that within a short space of six months I had managed to bed almost half of the female population that was in my church," he said.
Dube said things later went out of control when one of the ladies that he was dating in Bikita discovered that she was pregnant.
The lady told the pastor about the pregnancy, but in response, the man of the cloth denied responsibility and this did not go down well with the lady.
"From the relationships that I had with the female congregants from my church, I made it a point that I slept with almost all of them and from that habit, I impregnated one of the ladies, who later let the cat out of the sack.
"The lady, out of stress, shared her issue with other female congregants and by so doing she alerted other ladies, who I was also dating that I had a number of girlfriends within the same church," he said.
The man of the cloth said from these confessions, two female congregants later sat down and hatched a plan to press charges of rape as a way of fixing him as he had wasted their time.
The issue was reported to the police and he was arrested.
"When I was picked up by the police, my superiors at church were notified about the issue and during that time a lot of women were forthcoming to report that I had raped them. I realised then that my future was doomed.
"A docket was prepared and at first it had five counts of rape from two women and from the investigations by the police, they decided to remain with one woman, who was alleging that I had sexually assaulted her twice," he said.
Dube was found guilty of having raped one of the congregants, who had approached him in serious need of counselling as she was having problems with her husband.
The magistrate was convinced by the prosecutor that although Dube and the woman were having an affair, Dube had at one time raped her, resulting in her falling pregnant.
The magistrate said she had nothing against their relationship, but on the day in question the complainant never consented to sleeping with him.
"When I heard that statement coming from the magistrate that is when I realised that I was in serious trouble and from the trial it was agreed that I should be imprisoned for 31 years as I was very dangerous to be in the streets," he said.
Soon after the judgment he was moved to holding cells, awaiting his movement to a prison that houses "D" class inmates.
"Soon after being convicted, I was moved to Mutimurefu Prison and when I got there, I never thought I was going to make it as I had a lot of issues on my mind as my wife had already abandoned me during my trial.
"From that judgment I told myself that prison was going to be a place where I would start a new life considering that I had wronged society by taking advantage of the congregants, who approached me in serious need of my services, but I took that situation to my advantage by using those women to quench my sexual appetite," he said.
The inmate said soon after admission to Mutimurefu Prison, he went for an HIV test and discovered that he was HIV positive.
"When I got to prison, I discovered that my health was deteriorating very fast so I was urged to go for an HIV test and it was discovered that I was actually positive.
A lot of inmates by then were actually afraid of getting tested, so this forced me to come up with a concept called Khami Opportunistic Infections Organisation (KOICO)
"This group was created to try and educate other inmates to go for testing so that they could start their medication on time to avoid unnecessary loss of life,"he said.
Dube said from his stay in prison, he had discovered that crime does not pay, instead he lost people who were instrumental in his life as they could not stand the fact that he had turned into a rapist.
"21 years in prison my brother is not a joke and on this long journey I can tell you that I never gained anything except being abandoned by people who once loved me. With that in mind my brother I would like to tell my other friends out there to stay away from crime.
"At the moment I am left with nine years to go before I can complete this journey. I am only happy because I am on treatment and I have turned to be an Aids activist educating other inmates on the dangers of taking advantage of women," he said.
Dube said at the moment they were working on programmes that encourage inmates to be vaccinated against Covid-19 in prison as a lot of inmates did not understand the motive behind their vaccination against the disease.
"At the moment I am working with three guys as we try to educate inmates on the Covid-19 virus and the importance of them being vaccinated to avoid the spread of this disease. As we speak as the team that is spreading the message of Covid-19 we were vaccinated twice.
"We did this for the other inmates to really believe that this vaccine was meant to save lives and not to kill people.
From the time we started this awareness campaign I am happy to tell you that a lot of inmates have been forthcoming for vaccination," he said.
Source - B-Metro
