Religious

LIVERPOOL - A Zimbabwean gospel singer, model, and pastor based in the UK, Walter Chahwanda (34), has been convicted of seventeen offences, including sexual crimes against young girls and women.

HARARE - High Court judge Justice Maxwell Takuva has dismissed a preliminary objection raised by a former Apostolic Faith Mission (AFM) pastor in an ongoing dispute over the use of church premises, ruling that the application before the court was properly authorised.

Churches founded on towering personalities rarely survive their founders intact. Authority blurs. Family claims collide with institutional ones. Faith becomes a vocabulary for power struggles. ZAOGA did not follow that script, and that fact alone demands attention.

I grew up in ZAOGA. Its prayer culture shaped my faith, its emphasis on discipline formed my spiritual instincts, and its insistence on Scripture as the final authority framed how I understand Christianity.

When Apostle Joshua Selman attended the recent birthday celebration of Sandra Areh, popularly known as Selwoman (a play on Selman), and publicly referred to her as “my love”, the reaction was immediate and polarised.