Mihlali Ndamase has called out online gossip pages for peddling "false narratives" about her dating life after fresh rumours linked her to the late Zimbabwean tycoon Wicknell Chivayo.
Mihlali Ndamase says she is focused on her business and her peace in the wake of fresh dating rumours. Picture: Instagram/@mihlalii_n
Content creator and entrepreneur Mihlali Ndamase shut down speculation about her love life after fresh rumours linked her to Zimbabwean businessman Wicknell Chivayo, who died in a helicopter crash this week.
Mihlali opened the video, posted on her Instagram Stories on Thursday evening, by saying she has “absolutely no business tussling with pigs”, but that it is “alarming” and “starting to rub me the wrong way” that people can “sit behind a keyboard” and create a false narrative about her.
What irritates her most, she said, is that the narrative sticks. She pointed to what she calls the “Tony story”, in which a friend called to ask about it and she had no idea who the person was. This is in reference to gossip blog posts linked to Tony Kabongo.
Mihlali also referred to a “hit list” on which she says she doesn’t know most of the men named. “There’s just been so many stories surrounding me at this point,” she said, calling it “the lowest form of journalism”.
“Get a job, start a business, do something with your life,” she concluded, adding that the only relevance they have is tied to her name, and accused them of turning to her “with lies” whenever their social media engagement metrics dip.
‘I want to keep my peace‘
Mihlali questioned how anyone could be so fixated on her dating life, adding that people don’t know what’s going on in her life at the moment. She threw in a mention about her business and said she simply wants to keep her peace. She ended with a plea for the speculation to stop, calling it “really pathetic”.
A rumour with history
This is not the first time Ndamase’s name has been linked to Chivayo. The renewed speculation comes more than two years after she was first linked to him while both were in Miami. Chivayo publicly denied knowing Mihlali at the time, and she thanked him for clarifying. He said then that he had never met her.
Blogger Musa Khawula recently reignited the old rumours shortly after news of Chivayo’s death broke.
Who was Wicknell Chivayo?
Wicknell Munodaani Chivayo was 45 at the time of his death. To his followers, he was known as “Sir Wicknell”, and he was one of Zimbabwe’s most notorious and divisive businessmen.
He built an energy company, funded mostly by state contracts worth close to a billion dollars, and was known for giving away luxury cars on camera. Chivayo was a close ally of President Emmerson Mnangagwa and often posted pictures of dinners and meetings with African heads of state. Kenyan President William Ruto called him a “dear friend” after his death.
His business dealings drew sustained scrutiny. He was arrested on fraud and money-laundering charges in 2011, and again in 2018 over alleged bribery. He was ultimately acquitted in 2024 after prosecution over an advance payment linked to the Gwanda Solar project. Zimbabwe’s opposition accused authorities of failing to act against him over leaked audio recordings. In December 2025, the country’s anti-corruption commission said it found no evidence directly implicating him in a separate transaction.
However, Kenyan and Zimbabwean social media users revived these headlines as both countries turned the controversial businessman’s death into a trending topic.
The helicopter crash
Chivayo died in a helicopter crash in Marondera Rural, east of Harare, on 30 September. He was travelling with his wife, Lucy Muteke, and authorities reported no survivors. Police confirmed that six people died. The aircraft had left the family home in Gandami.
The cause has not been established. Investigators have begun examining what brought the aircraft down. Mnangagwa said he was “numbed” by the death.
