B. Application of Convention No. 87 243. Following the ratification of Convention No. 87 in April 2004 and its entry into force in the country on 9 April 2005, the Committee of Experts examined the Government’s first report at its November 2005 session. 244. At this and its subsequent sessions, the Committee of Experts expressed its concern at the use of the POSA and, in particular, Part IV on public gatherings, to impose sanctions on trade unionists for conducting strikes, protests, demonstrations or other public gatherings. While noting the Government’s statements that the POSA did not apply to the activities of trade unions and employers’ organizations, in light of the Committee on Freedom of Association’s conclusions in Cases Nos 2313 and 2365, the Committee of Experts felt compelled to stress that the development of the trade union movement and the increasing recognition of its role as a social partner in its own right meant that workers’ organizations must be able to voice their opinions on political issues in the broad sense of the term and, in particular, to express their views publicly on a government’s economic and social policy. It therefore requested the Government to take measures to ensure that the POSA was not used to infringe the right of workers’ organizations to express their views on the Government’s economic and social policy. 245. The Committee of Experts raised the following legislative points with regard to the Labour Act. First, its stressed the need to ensure the right to organize in the prison service, excluded from the scope of application of the Act by virtue of its sections 2, 3(2)(b) and 5(a). Additionally, in relation to the application of Article 2 of the Convention, the Committee of Experts requested the Government to provide information in respect of the fact that while, pursuant to section 36(1) of the Act, the Registrar can refuse an application for registration of a trade union or employers’ organization or federation, the legislation did not provide for grounds on which such a refusal could be based. 246. Second, in relation to application of Article 3 of the Convention, the Committee of Experts expressed concern at the power of the Minister to supervise the election of officers of a trade union or employers’ organization and to set aside any such election (section 51 of the Labour Act); and to regulate trade union dues as well as such matters as staff who may be employed by trade unions, their salaries and allowances, and the equipment and property that may be purchased by trade unions (sections 28(2), 54(2) and (3) and 55 of the Act). Furthermore, it noted that under the terms of section 120(2) of the Act, an investigator appointed by the Minister had powers to enter premises at reasonable times and without prior notice (paragraph (a)); to question any person employed on the premises (paragraph (b)); and to inspect, make copies of and take extracts from any books, records or other documents on the premises (paragraph (c)). The Committee of Experts considered that this section gave rise to two different sets of problems from the standpoint of freedom of association. In the first place, the Committee of Experts recalled that the right of the inviolability of trade union premises necessarily implied that the public authorities may not insist on entering such premises without prior authorization or without having obtained a legal warrant to do so and any search of trade union premises, or of unionists’ homes, without a court order, constituted an extremely serious infringement of freedom of association. In addition, the Committee of Experts considered that the control exercised by the public authorities over trade union finances should not normally exceed the obligation to submit periodic reports. The discretionary right of the authorities to carry out inspections and request information at any time entailed a danger of interference in the internal administration of trade unions. The Committee of Experts considered that measures of administrative control over trade union assets, such as financial audits and investigations, should be applied only in exceptional cases, when justified by grave circumstances (for instance, presumed irregularities in the annual statement or irregularities reported by members of the organization), in order to avoid any discrimination between one trade union and another and to preclude the danger of excessive intervention by the authorities which might hamper a union’s exercise of the right to organize 68 Meetings-2009-Zimbabwe C of I-2009-12-0035-3-En.doc/v3