Contempt of court: 11 AEC pastors arrested so far

MBABANE – A deputy sheriff and police officers stormed into a church conference at Nyandza High School on Friday evening and detained eight pastors.

The conference, which was in progress at the time of arrival of the police and the deputy sheriff, was stopped in the same evening.

A source close to the church informed this publication that the deputy sheriff and police officers asked for the one who was in charge of the conference and relayed to him their mission to the venue.  “The conference was continuing and the pastors were told about the presence of the (deputy) sheriff and the police. They were taken to the police station and the service was stopped,” explained the source. The pastors were taken to Bhunya Police Station.

This was after Judge John Magagula issued an order on Friday that the pastors of the Africa Evangelical Church (AEC), who had organised and held the conference at the school, be kept behind bars for seven days for defying a court order interdicting the conference.

However, the pastors did not spend the night at the police station as they were released under unclear circumstances.

This resulted in the AEC, which had instituted the contempt proceedings against 15 of its pastors from different branches across the country, raising complaints.

According to sources close to the matter, 11 of the pastors were then taken in at Mbabane Police Station yesterday.  The pastors are said to have been collected from their various homesteads. Four of the remaining pastors are expected to be taken in today.

Apart from ordering that the 15 pastors be jailed for contempt, Judge Magagula ordered that anyone found at the conference venue must show cause why they should not be held in contempt.

Last Thursday, the High Court judge directed the pastors not to proceed with the church conference, which was scheduled for August 28 – 31, 2025 at the school.

The court also ordered that the pastors be sent to jail for seven days, and not the 30 days that the church had prayed for.

The AEC’s application to find the pastors guilty of contempt was filed after the church discovered that the conference was continuing despite an order issued the previous day interdicting the event.  The court also ordered that the pastors, who were respondents, do not have any powers to call any church conference, including the one scheduled for August 28 – 31, 2025 and it was declared unlawful.  

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