adminThe Public Order and Security Act provides for the secondment of members of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces to work under the command of the Commissioner General of Police for the purposes of maintaining the peace when need be. When the MDC-Alliance ran riot in central Harare, most of the police officers were deployed at polling stations countrywide prompting the ZRP to invoke Section 37(1) of POSA to boost their ranks, the section reads:
37 When Defence Forces may assist Police Force under this Act
(1) If, upon a request made by the Commissioner of Police, the Minister is satisfied that any regulating authority requires the assistance of the Defence Forces for the purpose of suppressing any civil commotion or disturbance in any police district, he may request the Minister responsible for defence to authorise the Defence Forces to assist the police in the exercise of their functions under this Act in the police district concerned.
(2) Where authority is given under subsection (1) for the Defence Forces to assist the police –
(a) every member of the Defence Forces who has been detailed to assist the police in any police district in the exercise of their functions under this Act shall be under the command of the regulating authority concerned; and
(b) a member of the Defence Forces who is assisting a police officer in the exercise of his functions under this Act shall have the same powers, functions and authority, and be subject to the same responsibilities, discipline and penalties, as a member of the Police Force, and liable in respect of acts done or omitted to be done to the same extent as he would have been liable in the same circumstances if he were a member of the Police Force, and shall have the benefit of any indemnity to which a member of the Police Force would in the same circumstances be entitled.
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