ON International Workers’ Day, Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR) joins the global community in commemorating the indispensable role of workers in sustaining the economy and society.
In 2025, International Workers Day is commemorated under the global and crucial theme titled “Occupational Health and Safety: A Fundamental Right at Work” and also includes an explicit additional focus on the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) and digitisation on occupational health and safety.
The theme underscores the legal and moral imperative to safeguard every worker’s health, safety, and dignity in the workplace.
Section 65 of the Constitution guarantees the right to fair and safe labour practices and standards, including fair wages, safe working conditions, and protection from forced labour. Zimbabwe is also a state party to critical international instruments, including the International Labour Organisation (ILO) conventions on occupational safety and health, as well as the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, which enshrine labour rights as fundamental human rights.
Despite these legal commitments, the reality facing Zimbabwean workers remains deeply troubling. Many workers continue to labour under hazardous conditions without adequate protective measures or access to remedy in cases of workplace injuries or fatalities.
Workers in the private and public sector continue to earn low wages that do not allow them and their families to live above the poverty datum line, while unemployment and inequality is increasing at a shocking pace. It is saddening that government and employers in private enterprise have turned their backs on the working people.
The situation is especially dire in the informal sector, which accounts for the vast majority of the country’s workforce. The widespread criminalisation of informal livelihoods further exacerbates their vulnerability to exploitation, harassment, and unsafe working environments. Informal workers are routinely excluded from occupational health and safety protections, social security schemes, and legal redress.
The suppression of trade union activities and the intimidation of workers seeking to exercise their right to freedom of association and peaceful assembly remains systemic. The arbitrary arrest, detention, and harassment of labour leaders, which recently culminated in the apprehension of some University of Zimbabwe lecturers undermines the constitutional promise of labour justice. The conduct of law enforcement agents in suppressing legitimate activities of trade unionists is grossly unlawful and amounts to a serious violation of defenceless workers’ right to freedoms of expression, association and assembly.
On International Workers Day, ZLHR calls upon government to urgently fulfil its constitutional and international legal obligations by reforming and enforcing occupational health and safety laws to align with international standards, ensuring that all workers, including those in the informal economy, enjoy safe and healthy workplaces. Furthermore, deliberate steps should be implemented to end the harassment and criminalisation of trade unionists and labour rights defenders including upholding the right to organise, bargain collectively and peacefully protest as such freedoms are guaranteed in the Constitution.
ZLHR reaffirms that workers’ rights are inseparable from the broader human rights framework. The right to a safe and healthy working environment is not a privilege — it is a fundamental human right that the state is duty-bound to respect, protect, and fulfil.
Qina Sisebenzi Qina!
Shinga Mushandi Shinga!
Long Live Zimbabwean Workers!
ENDS
Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights
Kodzero/Amalungelo House
No. 103 Sam Nujoma Street, Harare, Zimbabwe
Phone: (+263 8677005347, +263 242 764085/705370/708118
Email: info@zlhr.org
www.zlhr.org.zw
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