Illegality of Festival Guidelines The Festival Guidelines (herein Guidelines) are blatantly unlawful because they do not have any statutory basis, either in the Act or the Regulations themselves for similar reasons advanced above, namely, there is no legislative basis for registering or controlling festivals in the Act or the Regulations. They have no force of law whatsoever, yet they are draconian as they admittedly seek to curtail freedom of artistic expression to only those that the government finds desirable. Ministry officials, including the Minister, have no authority to sit at their desks and type out decrees to rule over festival organisers. Hence the notions of ‘clearance’ of festivals and ‘registration’ of festivals, as well as the requirement to submit to the ministry budgets and plans are manifestly void at law. It is strange that the guidelines actually stipulate festival registration ‘in terms of NACZ Act of 1985 and SI 87/2006’ when there are no provisions for such anywhere in the two statutes. They go even as far as to proscribe offences which literally hang in the air. Unconstitutionality The Guidelines, in addition, flagrantly violate numerous fundamental rights guaranteed in the Constitution, as was pointed out in the Coalition Against Censorship Press Statement upon their promulgation. The battery of fundamental rights trampled upon include freedom of expression through demanding there be a theme, right to privacy through demanding accounts and other information, as well as political rights. It is because of the foregoing that it is recommended that a constitutional challenge, not only of the Guidelines, but also of the offending provisions of the regulations, must be instituted without delay. 1.5.9 The Draft National Cultural Policy of Zimbabwe 2015 This is the leading policy document with implications for artistic expression. The policy, which will come into operation after the adoption of the Constitution, will replace the one adopted in 2007. Among other things, the policy reinforces the need to safeguard cultural heritage as a nexus of dignity. Some of the objectives of the policy are to create a cohesive and progressive 38 | P a g e