Critical for a free and fair electoral context is a pre-election environment that is devoid of irregularities and malpractices. In respect of this, the Constitution of Zimbabwe guarantees freedoms that include association and speech, inter alia, that must be upheld in the electoral process.39However, while, as already noted, the pre-30 July 2018 election environment was relatively peaceful, it was marred by some irregularities that subsequently brought into question the freeness, fairness, and credibility of the election. ZESN observed a number of anomalies including intimidation and harassment particularly by suspected ZANU-PF supporters; forced attendances of rallies; people being stopped from attending rallies; disruption of campaign rallies; hate speech; the misuse of government resources such as vehicles by the incumbent; traditional leaders who discharged their roles on a partisan basis; vote buying; unequal access to the publicly controlled media; people being not free to speak about politics or wear party regalia; destruction of rivals campaign materials; and bias in the public media. The uneven playing field was exacerbated by the absence of legislation that effectively regulates the use of political parties’ campaign finances. In instances where the conduct of electoral stakeholders was provided for in the Electoral Act, there was an apparent lack of political will to enforce the law. A notable case of is that of the president of the National Council of Chiefs (NCC) Fortune Charumbira who was taken to court for encouraging other Chief to support ZANU PF’s 2018 election campaigns. The Court order directing Chief Charumbira to issue an apology within seven days was disregarded with impunity. To make the playing field for electoral contestants even, there is need for enactment of appropriate legislation that can regulate campaign finance by political parties. The legislation should provide for audits, disclosure of sources, and limits as to how much money electoral contestants and political parties can spend during campaigns. While there were a few cases of overt violence, there was significant intimidation in the preelection environment. In terms of Section 133A of the Electoral Act Chapter 2:13 as amended up to 28 May 2018, acts that constitute intimidation, or attempts at intimidation, include achieving or attempting to achieve an objective through inflicting or threatening to inflict bodily injury upon a person; causing or threatening to cause unlawful damage to a person’s property; withholding or threatening to withhold from a person any assistance or benefit to which that person is legally entitled; persuading or attempting to persuade another person that he or she can or will be able to discover for whom that other person cast his or her vote in an election; and illegally doing or threatening to do anything to the disadvantage of a 39 Section 58 of Constitution provides for freedom of assembly while section 61 provides for freedom of the media. 59 | P a g e