Prince Harry allegedly sent a direct ‘unpleasant’ message to the chair of Sentebale – Dr Sophie Chandauka – after she refused to publicly defend his wife Meghan

Prince Harry and Dr Sophie Chandauka together last year (Image: Getty Images for Sentebale)

Prince Harry sent an ‘unpleasant’ message to the head of his former African charity after she refused to publicly defend his wife Meghan, it has been claimed. The Duke of Sussex dramatically quit as patron of Sentebale, a HIV charity he founded almost 20 years ago and has become embroiled in a public spat with Dr Sophie Chandauka, the organisation’s chair.

She issued a blistering statement of her own, criticising the move by Harry, co-founder Prince Seeiso of Lesotho and the trustees of the charity to step down. And in an interview yesterday, she claimed that after an awkward moment between her and Meghan was captured on camera at a polo match to raise funds for Sentebale last year, she was asked to issue a statement by Harry’s team defending the duchess.

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Harry and Meghan with Dr Sophie Chandauka and other polo players at a Sentebale fundraiser last year (Image: PA)

She said she refused the request saying “we cannot become an extension of the Sussex machine”. Now it has been reported that after Dr Chandauka’s refusal, Harry allegedly sent her a direct message asking her to “explain herself”. Sources told The Telegraph that the message was “unpleasant in tone” and used ‘imperious’ language leaving the charity chair “taken aback”. The Mirror has approached the Sussexes for comment.

The clip of the seemingly tense encounter between Dr Chandauka and Meghan resurfaced on the back of the explosive row being triggered. At the charity polo fundraiser in April in Florida last year, Harry and Meghan shared a kiss as the Duchess presented Harry’s winning team with a trophy.

Footage from the trophy presentation appeared to show Meghan asking Dr Chandauka not to pose next to Harry as he celebrated his win. Meghan awkwardly signalled for Dr Chandauka to move by repeatedly waving her hands towards the opposite side of the stage.

As a result, others on stage moved up to make enough space and the charity chairwoman had to crouch under the trophy to move into the spot Meghan asked her to be in. In an interview on Sky News yesterday, Dr Chandauka addressed the event claiming that Meghan had only decided to turn up at short notice – bringing her “very famous friend” Serena Williams with her. Recalling the day to Sir Trevor Phillips, she claimed: “We would have been really excited had we known ahead of time [Meghan was coming], but we didn’t.

“And so the choreography went badly on stage because we had too many people on stage. The international press captured this, and there was a lot of talk about the Duchess and the choreography on stage and whether she should have been there and her treatment of me.

Dr Chandauka was gestured to move for the photo by Meghan (Image: sussexroyal_hm / Instagram)

“Prince Harry asked me to issue some sort of a statement in support of the Duchess, and I said I wouldn’t. Not because I didn’t care about the Duchess, but because I knew what would happen if I did so, number one. And number two, because we cannot be an extension of the Sussexes.”

Footage from the event also appeared in Polo – a Netflix documentary produced by Prince Harry that premiered on the streaming service last year. And Dr Chandauka also suggested that allowing his Netflix show to film a Sentebale fund-raiser almost wrecked the event.

She claimed: “We had a very generous family that was happy for us to use their polo grounds at a material discount. And then, about a month before the event was about to take place, Prince Harry called the team and said: ‘I’m doing a Netflix show, and I would love to bring a camera crew.”

The charity chair alleged that no one involved in the fundraiser had agreed to appear on a TV show. Another problem was that the venue owners allegedly now saw the event as a commercial undertaking and named a high price, she said. She added: “We couldn’t afford it … so now we lost the venue.” However, the event did go ahead at what Dr Chandauka says was a different venue.

Since Dr Chandauka’s latest interviews, representatives for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have not commented. However, a source close to the former trustees and patrons of Sentebale dismissed her comments as a “publicity stunt”. They added: “They remain firm in their resignation, for the good of the charity, and look forward to the adjudication of the truth.”