‘Rape allegations were made up to destroy me and my church’

Rape-accused leader of the Rivers of Living Waters Ministries, Bishop Stephen Zondo, believes that his enemies are behind the rape allegations he is facing in court.

- By Mawande AmaShabalala

Zondo, one of the eminent church leaders in South Africa with a huge following, believes the charges against him were trumped up to destroy his character and bring down his church.

The Bible puncher was speaking to Sunday World Engage in a wide-ranging interview about his upbringing, his church, political involvement and politics of the church broadly.

A self-proclaimed hustler, who rose from a hustling teenager selling apples to leading one of the biggest churches in the country with more than 64 branches across the SADC region, believes that his rise to the top attracted a lot of enemies.

Zondo says there have been multiple events of trying to bring him down, starting as far back as 2010, when his church building south of Gauteng was made a public-viewing area for the Fifa World Cup.

Already at the time, he said, there were queries about why his church was selected and whether or not he was making money from that.