Almost one year ago exactly, Prince Harry and Prince Seeiso resigned as royal patrons of Sentebale, the Lesotho-based children’s charity they founded in honor of their late mothers. What followed after their resignations has been nonstop shenanigans and chicanery from Sophie Chandauka. Chandauka’s latest is that she’s suing Harry and… Sentebale’s former trustee Mark Dyer for defamation, claiming that Harry and Dyer organized a campaign to destabilize Sentebale. She’s apparently getting outside funding for this lawsuit. My theory is that her smear campaign against Harry last year was an attempt to force HIM to sue her or sue Sentebale. She never expected Harry to walk away completely and refuse to engage with her nonsense.
Anyway, the whole reason why Harry and Seeiso got to the crisis point where they felt the need to resign was because many within Sentebale’s Board of Trustees resigned en masse over Chandauka’s mismanagement of the charity. That directly caused Harry and Seeiso to stand with the trustees and resign in protest of Chandauka as well. That’s often ignored in British reporting about this catastrophe, but it’s come back to the forefront given Chandauka’s lawsuit against Dyer. Now the Times of London got their hands on the trustees’ resignation letter:
The former trustees of the charity founded by the Duke of Sussex accused its chair of misconduct, intimidation and risking the charity’s future, a previously unseen resignation letter shows. The letter has emerged days after Sentebale sued Harry for defamation following a long-running spat between him and the Lesotho-based charity’s chair.
The letter was sent when the board of trustees and Harry resigned in protest of Chandauka’s stewardship of the charity in March 2025. It has not been made public until now. The trustees said they had “unanimously decided to resign” after raising “significant concerns” about her conduct. They wrote that they had asked Chandauka to step down after months of “significant issues”, adding that this was “not a sudden decision” but one reached after sustained difficulties.
They alleged a “breakdown” in relationships with trustees, staff and major funders, and accused her of attempting to manipulate board minutes. They also claimed her tenure had an “adverse effect” on the charity.
The letter also claims Chandauka responded to calls for her to step down by making “vague and deeply troubling allegations” to “threaten and intimidate the board, its patrons and a donor”. The trustees said these actions further “diminished trust” within the organisation. The dispute intensified when she sought a High Court injunction to block a board meeting at which trustees planned to vote on her position.
“There can be no more damning evidence of your failure to act as a leader capable of putting the charity’s best interests first,” the trustees wrote. They warned the situation had become “untenable” and said the charity faced “irreparable damage”.
They added: “This attack from within threatens to destroy Sentebale for good.” The trustees also said that Harry and Prince Seeiso, the charity’s founding patrons, were “aligned” with their position and would step down while Chandauka remained in post.
The letter warned that if replacements could not be found, the trustees would consider “options for the charity’s closure and transferral of its remaining assets to another charity with similar aims”. The letter, signed by Mark Dyer and five other trustees, sheds light on the internal dispute that escalated into a High Court defamation claim against Harry and the former trustee Dyer.
Once again, Sentebale has been destroyed from within because the UK’s Charity Commission refused to do their jobs as a regulatory agency. The Charity Commission thought it was worth it to cause problems for Prince Harry rather than take out the trash and actually say that Chandauka needs to go. It was abundantly clear last year that the trustees, co-founders, sponsors and royal patrons all had well-documented issues with Chandauka’s mismanagement and financial impropriety, not to mention her frankly disturbing behavior. The fact that Chandauka went on an interview spree last year, shrieking about Harry and Meghan, should have been the biggest clue that this was all a f–king scam on her part.
Photos courtesy of Cover Images, screencaps courtesy of Sky News.
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- The Duchess of Sussex presents the trophy to her husband, the Duke of Sussex after his team the Royal Salute Sentebale Team defeated the Grand Champions Team, in the Royal Salute Polo Challenge, to benefit Sentebale, at The USPA National Polo Center Featuring: Prince Harry, Duke Of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess Of Sussex Where: Wellington, Florida, United States When: 12 Apr 2024 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- The Duchess of Sussex presents the trophy to her husband, the Duke of Sussex after his team the Royal Salute Sentebale Team defeated the Grand Champions Team, in the Royal Salute Polo Challenge, to benefit Sentebale, at The USPA National Polo Center Featuring: Prince Harry, Duke Of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess Of Sussex Where: Wellington, Florida, United States When: 12 Apr 2024 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- The Duchess of Sussex the Duke of Sussex poses for pictures with the teams after he took part in the Royal Salute Polo Challenge, to benefit Sentebale, at The USPA National Polo Center Featuring: Prince Harry, Duke Of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess Of Sussex Where: Wellington, Florida, United States When: 12 Apr 2024 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- The Duke of Sussex during the awards ceremony after he played in a polo match during the Royal Salute Polo Challenge, to benefit Sentebale, at The USPA National Polo Center Featuring: Prince Harry, Duke Of Sussex Where: Wellington, Florida, United States When: 12 Apr 2024 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
Hard to imagine any rational person staying where they were not wanted. Speaks to this woman’s view of herself. Founding patron one of whom has donated relentlessly to keep the charity afloat in his mother’s memory and you think you are entitled to siphon off the funds to have a job to say you are chair of a charity, does not make sense to me. I also believe the structure of the charity allowed this to happen, because for 2 decades the principals were essentially running it. This woman must have mental health issues because this lawsuit, her refusal to leave just does not make sense. We all believe someone else is pulling her chains.
What the Actual F*ck is the point of the charity commission?
Funny how these regulatory agencies never seem to be able to do the jobs they are supposed to do when it comes to the Sussex’s almost like their is someone behind the scenes threatening them..🤨🤔 we all know this entire situation has WanK stamped all over it and I’m sure Peggy has been raging and crying at every agency and commission behind the scenes.
That charity commission is a joke. Its just an attack dog for the senior royals. When Harry and Meghan stepped down as working royals the charity commission announced their intent to investigate the Sussexes former uk charity and it took them almost a year to find no financial mismanagement.
After the blow up with Susan Hussey and Ngozi Fulani the charity commission all of the sudden had to investigate Ngozi Fulani’s charity Sistah Space which ended with her resigning as Chief Executive Officer. The most galling thing about that outcome is the only reason she was invited to the palace and encountered Susan Hussey was because of all the good work she and her charity were doing. The royals/firm used the charity commission to destroy their little diversity prop as soon as she didn’t play ball.
Now surprise surprise the charity commission wasn’t helpful with the Sophia and Sentebale situation. At this point its very obvious who the charity commission serves and its not the people or the greater good.
I want to learn more about the “manipulation of board minutes.” That’s some pretty serious wrong-doing. Yikes, the charity commission really failed sentebale and I suspect the lawsuit will be tossed out. But I hope information about who is funding the legal action is revealed.
Yeah last year someone here pointed out the various issues that happened at other places she “ran.” She’s a thief.
So correct me if I’m wrong, but I feel like a lot of this was expressed last year. Perhaps not in a flat out letter, but maybe in the interviews with some of the trustees that they did with newspapers in the UK? That was always the rationale behind them wanting her to resign, that she was spending a lot of money on ” consultants” who had connections to her, and alienating their existing and long established, loyal sponsors, which is why they didn’t have the polo tournament in 2024.
In any case though, this has fallen apart pretty quickly. It’s Tuesday morning and this story broke Friday afternoon. And now you have the actual resignation letter, and the charity commission themselves asking how suing benefits the charity, plus people questioning who is providing this external funding and why are you using the funds that way?
She is looking for every way under the sun to not have to explain financial accountability for what happened to that money that a previously solvent organization had before her tenure. And the British media of course can’t help themselves and ran to do her bidding. She’s shameless, but at what point are they going to learn?
Yeah. I think they all full stupid now because it’s a good question. How are you using this money? And you have to eventually answer the Charity Commission. I saw someone asking how the heck isn’t Prince Sessio getting sued?
Yeah, Sophie Chandauka is entering the “find out” stage of FAFO. Harry and the other trustees kept receipts! This story also explains something I noticed yesterday, which is that Sentabale currently only has three trustees (Iain Rawlinson, Sophie, and a doctor from John Hopkins). That seemed low for this kind of charity. But this article mentioned the resignation of “Dyer and five other trustees” plus co-founders Harry and Prince Seesio resigned. That’s an alarming loss of accountability and oversight. I hope “charity expert” and William ally Rawlinson gets alllllll the questions about what exactly he is doing there.
I don’t understand why the woman from Johns Hopkins is still there. Originally there were two other professional women appointed as trustees after the original resignations, but they got themselves out of there pretty quickly as what was going on with Sentebale began to look increasingly questionable.
@Jay … I wonder if the Charity Comission was persuaded by Rawlinson’s presence (with his connection to William’s African Tusk Trust) or by him directly that all would be well, so their review wasn’t as indepth or as harsh as it could have been.
This woman will get her karma and I hope it is served extra hot. Whether or not she’s fronting for someone else, karma will visit her. She cares nothing about those people who the charity was set up to help, she’s an evil person.
WTF is wrong with this woman? Why is she refusing to leave an organization that doesn’t want her and that she is actively trying to destroy? What’s in it for her? I know its easy to say “William!!!” but this is definitely way beyond him. Maybe he’s taking advantage of the chaos but it seems the chaos has been going on for years.
Is this resignation letter what she’s using as the basis for her defamation lawsuit? I’m not familiar with the particulars of UK law in this matter but I can’t see that surviving since it wasnt published or disseminated etc.
I’m glad (and surprised) that the Times seems to have found its journalism hat again.
Honestly I think that this is just someone with an over inflated ego and a lack of actual qualifications crashing and burning under a large spotlight.
I’m sure that Kensington Palace and the British media found this to be a can’t miss opportunity to stick it to Harry, but it sounds like she is just someone that has been able to increasingly get higher paid roles that she was unsuitable for, and when she was found out her ego couldn’t handle them realizing their mistake.
She has to be like a burr at Sentabale, because where is she going to go after that? All the other organizations from what I understand that she was at the head at have gone under and similar circumstances, either being in the red or not being operational. She’s been all over the media, and making complaints, who would bring her on board for their non-profit or charity? You don’t have any actual successes to point to, and in fact you presided over large losses.
Any board that would bring her on as a director has to be doing something shady themselves. I think she realizes that, and knows that she will never be able to command a salary like she’s getting now and that she needs on her end after this debacle. So she’s stuck in, because where else is she going to go?
i think this is as reasonable an explanation as anything. She overplayed her hand as we’ve been saying and now its just kind of like…..she has to go down with the ship. She’s thinking this lawsuit will be a lifeline but we’re seeing clearly that its not.
Well, she might end up with nowhere to go. The Charity Commission can force a charity to close if there has been mismanagement.
Yes, this is what I can’t figure out – what’s in it for her? She seems to be a grifter, but grifters don’t do things without some profit as a goal. Sentebale was never a large charity and now it’s half the size – only about half a million Euros in net assets (and about half of that in cash). Even if she stole it all and ran away, it would be hardly worth all this very public chaos.
I think her and her brother stole money and are trying to prevent a criminal investigation. Reading again what was said last year and what she did at prior organizations. I think she’s 1) insane and 2) thought she get away with this if she tossed Prince Harry and his wife at the press. She sounded like a nut when she argued Serena Williams shouldn’t have come to the polo match and Meghan wanted to be in all of the photos and was rude to her.
I agree. She is spiraling. Being an agent of chaos acting on behalf of KP with Rawlinson as her handler does not explain all this outrageous behavior. She kicked Harry out of his own Charity, she managed to stay as head of said charity so mission accomplished? Yet here she is. So yes I think you’re right she is trying to cover up criminal financial stuff. This whole thing can be a Netflix documentary or even a movie with a potentially Oscar worthy role for Viola Davis.
Someone needs to demand a forensic accounting. What came out last year was already bad enough.
Yeah, I think there must be some self- dealing (all those “consultants” she hired must have given her a cut) or financial impropriety that Sophie is trying to cover up. Which really begs the question of why she is now suing and riling the whole mess up again? Is it desperation? Hubris? Who knows.
As for Rawlinson’s role, I agree that we can’t make him solely responsible for the mess she is making. But why is he there? And more to the point why is he STILL there? I can’t help but think that KP thought this story would throw a wrench into Harry and Meghan’s Aussie tour. The timing is too suspicious. But, much like the bullying accusations before the Oprah interview, it backfired right in their faces.
In the media’s haste to attack Harry they sided with someone who was toxic and destroying Sentebale from within. The Charity Commission also fell down on the job and is partly responsible for the current situation.
@kaiser (and everyone else), why do you think she wanted Harry to sue her? To what end?
I think the theory is that either William or the gutter press might be bankrolling, manipulating, or in cahoots with her. If Harry sued, they would get discovery. Just another way to harm him, this time at the expense of in-need children.
See, I’m hoping this will get dismissed. While I’d love to follow the money, I’d rather just not have this of through the courts with all the discovery. Bc yes, that’s what the papers want. All the discovery information for articles.
Harry could still counter sue and I think he probably has more standing for defamation considering her talk show tour last spring.
Common p.r. tactic. They had no grounds to sue Harry so they made it so awful and put the viability of the charity at risk so he would feel obligated to do something to get her out. When Harry walked away instead and there was no lawsuit from him that would subject the participants to discovery the tabs were outfoxed and couldn’t get ahold of docs and depositions to write about, so they probably financed her suing Harry to get the same result. Disgusting since it all is at the detriment of the kids the organization serves..
I can virtually guarantee that William got wind of the brouhaha at Sentebale and got his yes-man into the organisation, parachuted in as a spare trustee, to steal it out from under Harry, use the fiasco to malign Harry even more grievously than he has done, and take over managing the organisation as a white knight. As they’re called in the Southern states. LOL. All for the good of the children, obviously, who are uppermost in William’s mind. Of course. But Sophie is such a blazing loose cannon, William is now taking what we would call friendly fire, if the term hadn’t lost all meaning in his one-sided war with his brother.
I said the other day she’s a flat out scammer. I am not blaming anyone else for this mess. She’s a scammer. She forced herself into that position after alleging racism and then as you can see she started spending funds for “talks” by famous people which was bonkers. I still say that she went after Harry and Meghan, not because of William or Ian, but because the press ate it up so prettily until Prince Sessio came out and was like hey I also want you gone. This whole thing has been ugly and I hate hate hate she’s a Black woman who thought she could attack another Black woman to prevent being held accountable.
Also as someone else said, this letter came out last year! I am glad people are now realizing she’s full of it, but they ignored all the signs last year she was a thief and liar. And I am glad the Charity Commission looks like idiots. They are now realizing that both sideing this mess was a bad idea. And I honestly don’t agree they got forced to via the Royals. Sophie went on a threatening spree last year. Maybe now they realize she’s full of crap and hey we should call out she’s doing illegal crap still!
This aligns with a lot of my thoughts on this. Do I think William is taking advantage of the chaos like I said above? Yes. But I don’t think he played the long game to install Sophie and then watched her crash and burn etc. I just think she’s a problematic person, a scammer, a grifter, who thought she was going to use this charity to propel herself to international stardom or something. And I mean she’s getting headlines, but probably not the ones she wants.
Yep. I think based on everything she started this mess way before Ian came on board. I recall going, how do you threaten people to install you? And then the trustrees started sounding the alarm after trying to meet with her and she kept alleging racism. I think they just let a bad person into the org that destroyed it myself. And yes, do I think that William was like let me see if I can use this for my own ends? Yes, but now I don’t think he has anything to do with it. She’s a nut who doesn’t listen. Similar to Meghan’s birth father who Jason tried to control and then washed his hands of when he went rogue and started talking to everyone and their mother.
The fact that Chandauka went on an interview spree last year, shrieking about Harry and Meghan, should have been the biggest clue that this was all a f–king scam on her part.
Her world-wind media blitz making outrageous and ridiculous claims about Harry and Meghan were very troubling. I was amazed that FT and Sky News gave her a platform because her claims were ridiculous: rowing with a co founder and major fund raiser, resenting his high profile wife and famous tennis player attending a Polo match, taking umbrage with Netflix filming and promoting Sentebale? Iain Rawlinson egging her on was another red flag given his links to Wilbur. It all looked and smelt to high heaven. She sounded angry and unprofessional and not someone another sponsor would be keen to work with given her scorched earth approach to collaboration.Charity Commission UK should have reprimanded her about her loud and noisy campaign damaging the reputation of the charity and it’s ability to fundraise. The legal action is both financial and litigation abuse. She is the one GUILTY of a smear by media blitz of bizarre claims and she’s damaging Sentebale irrepairably ble with expensive and ridiculous legal action which is baseless and expensive!!
Lots of people showed great restraint in not releasing this letter before now. It’s past time. Big pat on the back to Harry, Seeiso, Dyer, and the other trustees for waiting this long, again showing they’re clearly the bigger people.
So many questions about Rawlinson. I agree Sophia is a scammer and have nothing to add about that. But also. The full letter published by the Times says that they were giving Sophie 10 days so find 2+ replacement trustees before the then-current 6-7 quit, otherwise they’d start shutting the charity down and transferring assets. So what happened then–did Sophie run to William, whine about his mean brother, and William sent Rawlinson?
Also, I read somewhere that Rawlinson was paid as a consultant not as a trustee, i.e. at a higher rate.
And why is Rawlinson sticking around for this sh!tshow? Any trustee with an ounce of conscientiousness and self-respect would have said, no, let’s use this “outside” money for the children. Rawlinson is trashing his reputation by sticking around. Is he really hoping Sophie will finally leave and he’ll be left in charge (and why not that other female trustee) of a charity that can’t afford to pay its 6 remaining staff, let alone pursue its mission of helping children? Or is he expecting a payoff in the future, maybe the sort of sinecure at Earthflop that Knauf got?
I thought Ian was involved with Sentable since 2024?
You could be right. But it wasn’t as a trustee, because he wasn’t one of the five board members who resigned to protest Sophie’s management. Perhaps there were more than five trustees at the time and he’s the only one who refused to sign? Or perhaps Sophie had hired him as a consultant?
Hired consultant, as I recall, until the board quit. I think the other current trustee is an MD & pediatric AIDS specialist.
Is this new? Sophie has a big “Join our Board” advert for new trustees right up on Sentebale’s website. You can apply right from the website, at the bottom of the page.
https://sentebale.org/sentebale-advert-for-trustees/
I’ve worked for several not-for-profits, and that’s NOT how it’s done. How embarrassing. And what an attractive opportunity for meaningful charity work and personal growth! Not. Although perhaps we should all apply and try to bring some actual skills and care to this charity.
That’s not at all how it works. And becoming a trustee usually includes a big honking donation to the charity. I notice the advert mentions that Princes Harry and Seeiso founded the organization – and there’s no mention of the ongoing kerfuffle except a note that the Charity Commission confirmed the validity of the existing board last year.
Yes, she’s still got Seeiso and Harry’s faces plastered on her site. She even still has a reference to the Sentebale Polo Cup with a picture of Harry playing polo, lol. https://sentebale.org/the-sentebale-polo-cup/
Last year she tried to claim she was cleared so people can start donating again. I got one of those emails…..She’s just living in a weird other reality.
How, with her history, did she get on the Board in the first place, and then rise to Director? She wasn’t brought in as Director, correct? I thought she rose from being a Board member first, but I may well be misremembering. Why would she ever have been invited to join? I don’t believe Sentabale wouldn’t have done due diligence and spotted her history — so how did she even get close enough?
Sophie is one of those people who looks good on paper. She’s got an MBE, she’s some type of “doctor”. Plus I think the charity never imagined that someone would go after them like that, especially someone from the continent who should be aware of the devastation AIDS has wreaked throughout African countries. I’m sure Sophie probably spun a good tale on how much she “cared” about the children. They took her at face value which is what scammers count on.
It came up when they were looking for a new Director that she threw a fit asking why wasn’t she being considered. And then she strongly hinted she would sue. It was in one of the papers last year when they started covering this mess and she then tried to act like she wasn’t talking crap on Prince Harry.
All this for a volunteer position. I’m sure this grifter thought she would be able to spin her association with Prince Harry into something big, despite her claim that he’s “toxic”. She is the toxic one, killing a charity that was helping so many. I really hope she gets what’s coming to her for that reason alone. But I’m afraid she’s had too much practice slithering away from her messes.
There is a special place in hell for Sophie and all the others who helped her to destroy a charity that was helping sick children.
The trustees also claimed her tenure had an “adverse effect” on the charity.
Understatement of the century.
This is not at all how it works. And becoming a trustee usually means writing a big honking check to the charity. I notice that the advert includes how the charity was started by Princes Harry and Seeiso – and the only mention of any kefuffle is that the Charity Commission confirmed the board’s validity last year.
Chandauka IS: a fraud, a liar, a manipulator, a destructive person, a thief of money and resources.
Chandauka IS NOT: a master’s degree (she has a bachelor’s degree), not a doctor (her “Dr.” is merely a courtesy title from some organization, which she has no right to use as “Dr.” before her name), not a director of any large corporation, but a “director” of a company that no longer exists, founded with her brother, which, through intermediaries, absorbed some of Sentabele’s money for “consulting.”
She also has a history of hostile takeovers, for which she was hired.
This video is worth listening to; it contains some facts.
https://youtu.be/a53KVaMLPeY?si=qW0jhmEAU-LwqWxy