CIO, all appointed by President Mugabe, remain unchanged, as have their clear, public and vocal support for President Mugabe and ZANU-PF. The partisanship of the security forces’ leadership has translated into abuses by these forces against MDC members and supporters, and civil society organizations. Although the Lancaster House and the new constitutions, as well as various laws, requires neutrality and impartiality from the security forces, no effort has been made to enforce them. Beyond the open endorsement of ZANU-PF, the security forces have been deployed across the country where they have intimidated, beat and committed other abuses against Zimbabweans perceived to be supporting the MDC or critical of the ZANU-PF officials in government. No members of the security forces are known to have been disciplined or prosecuted for acting in a partisan manner or committing criminal offenses against the MDC and its supporters. Concerns about the role of the security forces extend not only to situation prior to election day and the voting itself, but to the critical post-election period. Instructively, the CIO has no legislative framework guiding its institutional set up and operations. It is a department within the President’s Office—the Department for State Security—with a minister responsible for it and a director-general running it, its operations are shrouded in secrecy. The CIO has operated more as the intelligence arm of the ZANU-PF and has been implicated in serious human rights abuses against ZANU-PF’s political opponents. The unity government, with support from SADC and the African Union, should urgently take steps to ensure the political neutrality of the security forces, namely by investigating and prosecuting alleged abuses by security force personnel, publicly directing the leadership of the security forces to carry out their responsibilities in a professional and impartial manner, and appropriately punishing or prosecuting those who fail to do so. Urgent reforms are also needed to increase the likelihood of credible, free and fair elections. These include electoral reforms to ensure the independence and enhance professionalism of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission, and an updated voters roll under ZEC’s exclusive control. Civil society groups, including human rights organizations, should be able to freely conduct voter education across the country. State media should give equal access to all political parties without bias or favor, and laws infringing on the right to freedom of expression should be amended or revoked. Finally, there should prompt 3 HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH │ MAY 2013