A Harare man has been masquerading as a medical doctor and lying that he is based in the United States

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• January 27, 2026

A Harare man has been masquerading as a medical doctor and lying that he is based in the United States to execute his scheme of charming a number of women he met on a popular dating app.

Some of the women claim they were defrauded during the course of their romance.

Mathew Five, who allegedly assumed a fake identity as Desmond Phiri, and claimed he was an American-based medical doctor, promised some of the women that he was going to Desmond Makondora

A HARARE man has been masquerading as a medical doctor and lying that he is based in the United States to execute his scheme of charming a number of women he met on a popular dating app.

Some of the women claim they were defrauded during the course of their romance.

Mathew Five, who allegedly assumed a fake identity as Desmond Phiri, and claimed he was an American-based medical doctor, promised some of the women that he was going to marry them.One of the women was even promised a weekend retreat in Zanzibar with Matthew giving her US$8,000 spending money.

The victims include a disabled woman who narrated her ordeal to H-Metro.

“We met on Tinder (the world’s most popular dating app), then in person when he said he was relocating to America and would often send pictures, live locations in the US, and he also said he had a farm,” she said.

“He started saying he was having problems which needed money, and at one time asked for money, saying his daughter was admitted to a hospital after a stroke.

“He introduced me to a so-called cousin, they would ask for money, telling me they had no groceries and so forth.

“He told me he was divorced and wants to marry me in February and would ask for my ID, saying he wants to book a court marriage date. I lost over a thousand dollars until he just went quiet.”

Her story is just one of many similar tales.

Contacted for comment, Matthew dismissed the allegations and claimed they were all coming from one girl, whom he named as Nyasha.

“I have made a payment plan to reimburse her money,” he said.

“Yes, I am married, and I am not in the country. Those women are telling lies. I asked them to remove those comments, it’s all lies.

“My lawyer will get back to you. Those uniforms were part of the nurse-aid programmes I was doing. Mathew’s father, Mateyu Five, said he became aware of the story after a girl arrived at his house in Kuwadzana 5 looking for his son.

“Yes, there is one who came here looking for my son and told me about these dating issues. I have no contact with my son because he reaches out when he wants to.

“I have nothing to say about this, the women must speak to my son, not me, my house is just the place where he was raised.”

An InDrive driver, who has been named as part of the syndicate, distanced himself and said his role was just to collect cash after getting a directive from Matthew.

“I don’t work with that guy (Matthew), I only did regular errands for him until he then blocked me since he owes me money.”

It is believed Mathew runs a syndicate which has an unidentified woman and an InDrive driver and uses roaming American and South African mobile phone numbers.

They also use a number of local mobile phone numbers.

A number of victims have turned to Facebook to try and expose Matthew and he has in turn ordered them to take down their posts and comments or face cyber bulling charges.

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