A 47-year-old South African citizen from KwaZulu Natal, claiming to be “a messenger of God, sent to deliver a special message to Zimbabwean president Mr Robert Mugabe”, was fined for illegally entering Zimbabwe through the Beit Bridge border post without any travel documents.

Eric Larington Menziwa Maduna of Watersmith Village, Thukela District, Driefontein in KwaZulu-Natal, pleaded guilty to contravening that country´s immigration act when he appeared before Bulawayo magistrate Miss Sithembiso Ncube on Friday, 18 July.

He was fined ZW$20 billion or two weeks in prison, and he will be deported shortly.

Clad in a white gown, white head dress and matching gloves, Maduna stunned the court when he said the police had, after he had shown them a letter whose contents he did not disclose, allowed him to come into Zimbabwe.

“As a messenger of God, I just went to the police and showed them the letters, and I was allowed to enter Zimbabwe,” said Maduna, who is Xhosa and was speaking through an interpreter.

Asked why he had illegally crossed into Zimbabwe, Maduna said he was a "messenger of God."

The prosecutor, Mr Lovemore Chifamba, told the court that on 9 July at around midnight, Maduna, in the company of a Zimbabwean based in South Africa, Mr Edward Bhekumusa Thwala, crossed into Zimbabwe through the Beit bridge border post without valid travel documents and proceeded to Nkayi area in that country.

On 13 July, after returning from Nkayi, Maduna presented himself to Luveve Police Station in Bulawayo where he requested to see President Mugabe “to whom he intended to relay a God-given message relating to the cleansing of Zimbabwe and the whole world”.