THE STATE OF HUMAN RIGHTS REPORT |ZIMBABWE I 2017 Introduction reflective meeting convened by the Forum for its members. 1 On 22 March 2018, the Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum convened a reflective meeting to review the human rights situation in Zimbabwe in The Forum collated and compiled all information the year 2017. This report captures the substance of received to produce a representation of the state of the reflective meeting and the identified key human human rights in Zimbabwe in 2017. rights priorities for Zimbabwe. The information is supplemented by reports supplied by other partners The Human Rights of the Forum. The outcome is this report, the most Architecture comprehensive national human rights appraisal for The following are the key elements of the human Zimbabwe, which represents the collective view rights architecture used by the Zimbabwe Human of over 30 human rights organisations working in Rights Forum in monitoring the human rights situation Zimbabwe. in Zimbabwe. The idea of a locally generated human rights situation report came from the realization that the Forum’s member organisations are in constant contact with the grassroots at community level, therefore information gathered should be incorporated into a comprehensive national report because of its authenticity. The Bill of Rights Chapter 4 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe Amendment (No. 20) Act 2013, which enshrines the bill of rights, is the baseline for all human rights reports. Zimbabwe’s bill of rights protects the right to life, personal liberty, rights of persons in detention, right to human dignity, personal security, freedom from torture, slavery, forced labour, equality and non-discrimination, privacy, freedoms of assembly and association, freedom to demonstrate and petition, freedom of conscience, expression and media, access to information, language and culture, freedom of profession, trade or occupation, labour rights, freedom of movement and residence, political rights, the right to administrative justice, right to fair hearing, rights of accused persons, property rights, rights to agricultural land, environmental rights, freedom from arbitrary eviction, right to education, right to health care, right to food and water, marriage rights, women’s rights, rights of the elderly, rights of persons with disabilities and rights of veterans of the liberation struggle. Although we have a progressive Bill of Rights, the Forum believes that section 78 (3) of the Constitution which prohibits same sex marriage conflicts with section 56 of the same Constitution, which provides for equality and non-discrimination and is not in line with the best practices the world over. The report contains information on human rights violations; the nature and magnitude of abuses; the victims and perpetrators; events associated with human rights violations and factors that contributed to abuses in 2017. Case histories have also been incorporated to illustrate the nature and extent of these abuses. This report does not document every violation that took place in the year. It gives only an overview while detailed reports and cases are found in the Forum’s Quarterly Human Rights Report (QHRP) and in the reports of other human rights organisations. The Human Rights Monitoring Framework The information used in this report was obtained from the following sources: Reports from members of the Forum; Citizen reports received via the Ziso/Ilihlo platform; The Forum’s Public Interest Unit; Partner organisations; General reports from walk in clients of the Forum; Verified press reports from the media; and Round table human rights policy & practice The United Nations Human Rights Council in the 2016 Universal Periodic Review Process encouraged the Government of Zimbabwe to repeal all discriminatory law. The Forum also believes that The Forum convened the human rights policy and practice reflective forum on 22 March to, among other things, review the Zimbabwe human rights situation in 2017. 1 14