Arrests, Threats and Harassment of Journalists Following the declaration of Zimbabwe’s COVID-19 Regulations on 30 March 2020, the country witnessed an upsurge in the number of journalists that were harrassed, intimidated, assaulted and detained by members of the police and the army while covering their lawful professional duties. Violations involving 52 media workers that include journalists, vendors and media students, were recorded during the year under review. As mentioned earlier in this report, some of the notable cases involve the arrest of journalist Hopewell Chin’ono on two separate incidents on charges of incitement to participate in a gathering with intent to promote public violence, and defeating or obstructing the course of justice, respectively. On 30 July 2020, police raided and ransacked the home of ZimLive editor Mduduzi Mathuthu in Zimbabwe’s second city of Bulawayo reportedly looking for information on subversive materials linked to the then planned 31 July 2020 nationwide protests. The police said they believed Mathuthu was organising and advocating for the demonstrations adding that he was using his mobile phone to encourage people to demonstrate. Mathuthu’s nephew, Tawanda Muchehiwa, a media student, also went missing following his arrest on the same day. Muchehiwa only appeared before the magistrates court in Bulawayo on 4 August 2020 in the company of his doctor in bad health resulting from the torture he was reportedly subjected to during the time he was missing. His appearance in court followed a High Court habeas corpus application by MISA Zimbabwe through lawyer Nqobani Sithole. Subsequently, High Court judge Justice Makonese, on 1 August 2020, ordered the police to investigate Muchehiwa’s whereabouts and produce the outcome to the Magistrates Court at Tredgold Building in Bulawayo within 72 hours. Muchehiwa was later found that evening on 1 August 2020 around 2200hr after he was ‘dropped off’ at his place of residence by suspected state security agents. He had been missing since 30 July 2020 following 10