Unseen

by Reggie Yates

  It’s rare to be challenged on the fundamentals of what makes you who you are spiritually, let alone on camera. So making the Millionaire Preacher film for the Extreme South Africa series was a baptism of fire. Pun most definitely intended.

  Given my religious history and minimal connection to any organised religion, I was apprehensive but willing to explore religious themes on screen. This would be the first time in my career I’d be openly speaking about faith, Christianity, Islam and everything in between. The sensitivities associated were endless, as this project could only truly connect with the audience successfully if I were to totally give myself to the process. The only way this film could actually come close to its true potential was by me not only discussing what I encountered on camera, but also speaking openly about my own history and connection to the theme.

  At this stage of my career in factual filmmaking I was green. This was the first series of the ‘Extreme’ strand and I felt the weight of responsibility in terms of getting the series right. I was in Africa, I was fronting the first series with my name in the title and I couldn’t fuck it up. In hindsight, there is without doubt so much that could have been done differently and an endless stream of lessons learned from the mistakes I feel I made on screen.

  This would be my first time in South Africa. Unfortunately, I didn’t step off the flight anywhere near as objective as I’d have liked. I was quietly riddled with preconceptions of a divided country still weighed down by post-Apartheid hang-ups. I was convinced this would overshadow my experience, but then my race-related fears lost all importance as I was instantly confronted with a whole other juggernaut.

  After the obligatory post-flight rest day, I was chomping at the bit to get out and shoot. The first sequence scheduled to film seemed, on face value, simple. My director Sam had called for a walk through the town centre, which confused me, as I was unsure as to what a walk and observe on camera would deliver. I quickly found out exactly what Sam was after.

  Every street was filled with the sound of worship as various churches pumped their message out into the busy street via huge speakers. With statements as names, churches in Johannesburg aren’t shy in declaring their importance. Names like Christ The Solution, With God Anything Is Possible and Amen Tabernacle made clear how seriously they took themselves.

  With a different church every few hundred yards, lunchtime prayer was so popular I found the huge congregations of the more successful pastors literally spilling into the street. My stroll quickly became an education on the scale of South African faith as hundreds of people stood silently praying on the pavement via PA system. Desperate to take it all in and somehow understand, this inside/outside service became increasingly unusual to my virgin eyes. Suited business types and mums with kids skipped between the crowds without even batting an eyelid. Here, this was normal.

  As I continued my amble, now open-mouthed, every street offered its own church and speaker system sharing with passing pedestrians and traffic a new relentless and shouted sermon. With a different international Ministry of this or God’s Chosen Place of that on every corner, picking one tailormade for you wouldn’t be that difficult a task, considering every kind of Evangelical pastor imaginable had their own building big or small and a following to match.

  What struck me instantly was something I hadn’t considered. The live band, the type of people worshipping, and most importantly the message and its delivery, weren’t that dissimilar to the church I once attended with my own family in London.

  At the time we made the documentary, South Africa had more people living with HIV than anywhere else in the world, while 70 per cent of young people in the country were unemployed. The need for something to believe in and an insatiable appetite for miracles wasn’t only understandable, it made sense.

  Touch the screen and receive your miracle

  The intention of the episode was to unpack faith in young South Africans through the mega church Incredible Happenings and its incredibly popular pastor. Not only was its congregation well into the tens of thousands, it was almost exclusively made up of township people, some of whom had travelled for days to attend and receive their blessing. Its gregarious leader and undeniable force of nature, self-proclaimed Prophet Mboro was a man I had so many questions for.

  This multi-millionaire holy man is known to own seven houses, have over thirty cars and wear only the most expensive suits. Hitting the headlines continuously for the wildest of religious claims or practices, Mboro is a regular on the front page of every Johannesburg tabloid.

  Shortly before my trip, the prophet was not only connected to a zombie resurrection but accused of waving a gun around at a radio station. At the time of writing this chapter, Mboro was making international news for selling photos he took on his smartphone while in heaven, for 5,000 rand. The man is a true one-off.

  Proud of and continuously flaunting his wealth, Mboro dressed, lived and was treated like a rock star. Somehow his lifestyle and behaviour didn’t raise an eyebrow in his congregation and I needed to know why.

  Seeing first-hand the number of people coming through the door every Sunday to hear Mboro speak, I can’t stress enough just how popular the man is. He has a daily TV show and a daily radio show with over 200,000 listeners – for him, its simply outreach. The live call-ins both on TV and radio produced some of the more surprising ideas on how to heal. Touching the screen or the speaker was a regular instruction, and for every one person who fobbed it off as ridiculous, two would turn up at Incredible Happenings the following Sunday.

  A huge number of his parishioners are young, so my earliest confusion was how? For the smartphone-tapping, pop culture-consuming millennials, what was it about his message that resonated, and why didn’t they see the same things I did? I was dealing not just with a religious leader, Prophet Mboro was a celebrity.

  Bad criticism I’m happy for that, they made me famous

  In the churches I’d attended as a child, the pastors didn’t have time for kids; they were far too busy sweating at the podium speaking in tongues. I’d never met a religious leader who not only had the love and adoration of thousands but a congregation who all felt they had a personal relationship with the man.

  On my way in, I met a group of young choir members in the car park all buzzing and excited for the service that was about to begin. Their enthusiasm was infectious and driven by their love for the prophet and his powers. One of the group claimed to have been healed by Mboro in a service weeks before. Apparently she couldn’t walk, and with his healing hands, she now could. With the prophet proudly admitting that criticism made him famous, my plan was to observe and judge the man only on what I saw and nothing else. But based on what I’d just heard, I knew that would be difficult.

  After the conversation, Sam and I took a break in the car park. He smoked; I fiddled with the car stereo. It’s at this stage I should probably come clean about my poker face. Bear with me. My ability to hide my true feelings in situations this foreign is at best minimal, which is probably why my inner cynic took control of all facial expressions and I had no say in the matter.

  With the inevitable bad jokes out of the way, how to manage the following service without spending the entire time taking the piss was a genuine concern. I’d just spoken to someone who believed the prophet had granted her the ability to walk! There was too high a chance of more unreal shenanigans ahead for me not to be concerned that the film could descend into a piss-taking ignorance safari.

  Being snarky or know-it-all has never been a motivation for any of my work, as that role is well covered by many other filmmakers. So how would I navigate this shoot day while being respectful regardless of the constant stream of crazy? At this point, I had no idea.

  Opposite the main hall was a small store selling Mboro merchandise. T-shirts with the prophet’s face on colourful logos filled the stands, while a queue to pay went on for miles. Parishioners waited quietly holding onto their blessed items, proud to own something bearing the man’s
likeness, and it was this that slowly started to pull the humour from the situation. I was beginning to see for myself the scale of influence and, more importantly, the scale of belief.

  These blessed Mboro branded items included everything from water and salt to sanitary towels. Men were buying menstrual pads as well as the women due to their apparent powers to heal aches and pains anywhere on the body. How much belief did this huge congregation actually have in their chosen prophet, and how far could that go? I was about to find out.

  When Mboro arrived in the church his entrance was flanked by a team of burly security guards all holding automatic weapons. I’m not going to pretend I knew what kind they were carrying; the detail I ask you to focus on here is that they were holding firearms. Big ones. The loaded kind that need two hands to hold.

  A standing ovation met his entrance as the thousands in attendance reached new heights of excitement amid his presence. This was real rock star stuff, and the minute he hit the stage everything changed. Jumping, screaming and performing, songs and jokes fell from his mouth effortlessly. In no time at all, everyone was in the palm of his manicured hand.

  With cheers followed by laughter broken up by songs, a clear rhythm was established. The room was enthralled and entertained. The sick came forward and the prophet stepped up to heal all ailments, be they physical, mental or spiritual.

  As a non-believer not wanting to pray, my awkwardness was clear and the prophet was on it straight away. As a man not practising any religion, faking prayer felt like the height of disrespect. But with my seat in the front row giving me literally nowhere to hide, I was rumbled and firmly on the prophet’s radar for all the wrong reasons. At this stage I hasten to add, we hadn’t even spoken yet.

  Screaming women and crying men lined up in their hundreds, spinning a noticeable shift in mood. The band dropped their level, the prophet changed his tone and one by one he worked his way through the long queue of believers. The singing, live band and prayer hadn’t felt a million miles away from some of the things I’d seen or experienced in my old church back in London. But that was until the prophet began to heal.

  A twenty-two-year-old woman stepped up to complain on mic of a painful vagina. She spoke of a recent failed suicide attempt due to the decline in all areas of her life as she believed she’d been raped by a spiritual beast. The prophet attempted to tend to her vaginal pain by pushing down on her genitalia with a pointed patent shoe while speaking in tongues.

  During his on-stage and on-mic healing in front of the entire congregation, he referred to spiritual husbands and possessed vaginas. Any humour to be found in the situation had left the room. I’d never seen anything like this and, given the fact that any scepticism in this hall of thousands was limited to my chair alone, I knew that the next week might have one or two conflicts of opinion.

  After a seven-hour service, the collection began. Huge pink boxes were filled with sealed envelopes as people waited in line to give what they could. In a room of this size and with so many happy to wait, I’d never seen this many people willingly give up money, especially money they didn’t have to give. With a million pounds a year earned via donations and purchase of merchandise, Incredible Happenings was big business, and I was about to meet the CEO.

  Post-service I was granted an audience with Mboro. I was made to wait a short while before he emerged from a back room flanked by armed guards. Standing at no more than 5'2" in his patent Cuban heels, he schooled me on possession, witchcraft and talking cats during a crash course on what I’d just witnessed during his healing session.

  The prophet could smell the sceptic on me and looked me square in the eye while letting me know that, here, things are different. He made it very clear that, in Africa, people have faith and that African faith is placed in different things from the faith in my Western world.

  His tone was staunch but inclusive, warm but firm. This was a man who knew how to work the camera while letting me know exactly who was in charge.

  My intention to carry myself with a consistency in demeanour, tone and respect has served me well throughout my career. The first meeting with anyone – be they punter, pop star or politician – is always important. With that being said, I had a feeling I hadn’t won over the prophet just yet.

  The following day I found myself invited to join the prophet on a shopping trip. But after waiting for over three hours, it finally dawned on me. Culturally, the longer you’re willing to, or in my case made to, wait for somebody, the more important they are. Sat twiddling my thumbs, I knew that Mboro was making sure I was aware of just how important he was.

  When he finally arrived, he was entourage-heavy and ready to shop. We walked through the shiny mall to a boutique dripping in expensive gear. The shop owner greeted him like an old friend as they pulled armfuls from the rails. With the majority of suits on sale selling at £3,000 a time, the clientele was almost exclusively sports stars and rappers. Proudly announcing that his regular shopping trips usually totalled over £7,000 a time, Mboro doubled down on his status ensuring I knew who was superior. My choice of dirty Vans, shorts and a hoodie was hard for the prophet to hide his distaste for as, unfortunately, this was once again seen as a sign of disrespect.

  I’d offended the man. Again. Unintentional or not, I could feel his patience slipping and that he felt the BBC sending what looked like a man-child for someone clearly so important had begun to get his goat. Two days in and I’d already lost the person I was supposed to spend a hell of a lot longer with.

  Stood to one side watching the prophet jump from one loud suit to another, that crap poker face I mentioned began to once again reveal my true feelings about what I was playing a role in. This was a wealthy man, well within his rights and ability to splash the cash. The problem I felt so deeply that my anger forced me to leave the shop, was where that money had actually come from.

  With a bank balance powered by his congregation, Mboro continued to spend while pushing me to join him in splashing out. I flatly refused to buckle and he wasn’t happy at all.

  Sensing my distaste, the prophet explained that he sees himself as an inspiration. He believes that him spending gives the guy at the bottom of the ladder something to aspire to. In theory it made sense, but to me felt like a well thought-out excuse to be as frivolous and lavish as his financial equivalents – sports stars and entertainers.

  Tipped off by his head of security that my decision not to buy a suit and the line of questioning had rubbed the prophet up the wrong way, I pushed for another meeting to clear the air.

  Touch your biscuit, touch your Vuvuzela. I will heal you

  Along with his popular TV show, Mboro’s radio show attracted huge audiences. During the broadcast he encouraged his audience to attend Sunday’s service with underwear so he could heal the entire room en masse. This request was followed by an on-air blessing of the audience’s genitalia, where touching ones biscuit (vagina) or vuvuzela (penis) was encouraged.

  Outside of doing everything in my power not to laugh at the use of the word ‘biscuit’, I had no choice but to challenge him on this as, for me, religious or not, the blessing, cleansing and stamping of private parts was coming up far too often.

  The stock response that I didn’t understand his world ended the conversation and my frustration began to build. How was I to understand his world if he wouldn’t let me in?

  It was clear that a decision had been made and my disbelief rendered my intentions as cynical. To begin to understand how his world worked I needed him to give me more. No matter how many jokes I cracked or compliments I made about his ill-fitting suits or shoes clearly two sizes two big, Mboro was having none of it.

  Possibly my efforts were let down by my feelings as I honestly couldn’t have been further from liking the man. What he was doing and how he lived his life was a genuine problem for me.

  Starting in TV as a kid and coming home to a council estate gave me a heightened awareness of class, status and wealth at a very young age. My defa
ult has and will always be a level of embarrassment in seeing those who don’t have much, killing themselves to appear as if they do. Equally, the wealthy flaunting their money via garish purchases is simply bad taste. This man was showing none.

  How the head of a church could live the life of a millionaire on the backs of the poor truly fucked with me. The prophet had no issue in spending and justified this, meaning no guilt was allowed to even raise its head. Mboro saw himself as providing a service and therefore should be paid for it. He’s a man selling hope and faith as interchangeable products and for him that’s exactly how it should be done.

  This was the first time I’d truly challenged the prophet to his face yet he engaged in the conversation. It was frank and honest but clearly not what he wanted, especially on camera.

  My time on his turf had begun to go sour and I was summoned by his legal team. It was explained that my disrespect had gone too far. I was expected to treat him as a leader and not an equal. Clearly my informal tone and line of questioning were unwelcome to the prophet, as this was a man sat at the very top of his world. Financially and in the eyes of the Almighty, this man was convinced he had no equal. Then I showed up in shorts refusing to pray and calling him mate every two minutes. I could see why I’d pissed him off.

  My learning curve as a documentary filmmaker has been steep at the best of times and during this experience, every day was a lesson. My feelings were getting in the way of the film, rather than helping it and that was a first. I had no choice but to swallow all pride and do whatever was necessary to get back into the room with Mboro. It was time to go shopping.

  After a day of grovelling I was allowed to follow the prophet as he visited a small township. I had a shave and bought a white shirt in an effort to present something consistent with the appearance he seemed to expect from a journalist. As I buttoned up the shirt in the mirror, I had to keep telling myself that I just had to play along. ‘This is just for the film, you’re not selling it bruv.’ I was.