government has often been a stumbling block to investigations, the search for information and general prosecution of perpetrators of human rights violations by the police force. Most members of the police are unlikely to cooperate with investigations into abuses by the police for fear of being held in contempt of the police regulations. The new, current government might present opportunities to investigate senior officers who were involved in rights violations. The Forum is aware that it might be impossible to carry out prosecutions for each human rights violation by the police that is taken to the courts. Prosecutorial selectivity leading to the prosecution of the most serious abuses is what the Forum has called for, and in several cases victims themselves have made similar calls. If executed well, the selectivity by itself would not render any process of prosecutions unfair unless of course it had been deliberately discriminatory, unbalanced, vindictive or unreasonable. The challenge of following orders from above Scholars have for a long time debated issues around how to deal with perpetrators who claim to have received orders “from above”. The challenge in dealing with this matter is quite vexing. However, David Gray in a compelling argument, notes that: “abusive regimes do not suddenly find themselves entangled in crime but are usually guided by “norms, social ontologies, and historical teleologies that operate through official state agents, constructing a public face of law that sanctions and organizes violence perpetrated by institutional actors and private citizens‟.⁴⁹ He further notes that the “public face of law” he refers to encompasses “formal legislation, executive orders, the body of prevailing public threats, institutional expectations represented by institutional agents, and commonly represented public and legal expectations as they would have been perceived by a reasonable person in the actor's condition and position at the time of his act”.⁶⁵ Commenting on the state's and private citizens' complicity in the land invasions in 2002 the FactFinding Mission of the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights to Zimbabwe noted that: The Government cannot wash its hands from responsibility for all the happenings. It is evident that a highly charged atmosphere has been prevailing, many land activists undertook their illegal actions in the expectation that government was understanding and that police would not act against them – many of them, the War Veterans, purported to act as party veterans and activists. Some of the political leaders denounced the opposition activists and expressed understanding for some of the actions of ZANU PF loyalists.⁵⁰ Statements by senior ZANU-PF officials over the years regarding policing and human rights may have sent wrong signals to the police leading to abuses. In such cases the members of the police have often invoked two excuses: That they were following orders, or that they do not have permission to speak on behalf of the police. Both excuses have frustrated and compromised the process of prosecutions for ⁴⁹ DC Gray, 'An Excuse Based Approach to Transitional Justice,' (2006) 74 Ford Law Review, 1 at 3. ⁵⁰ Executive Summary of the Report of the Fact-Finding Mission to Zimbabwe 24th - 28th June 2002. Anti-Impunity Report 25