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(1) The Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission has the following functions—
(a) to promote awareness of and respect for human rights and freedoms at all levels of society;
(b) to promote the protection, development and attainment of human rights and freedoms;
(c) to monitor, assess and ensure observance of human rights and freedoms;
(d) to receive and consider complaints from the public and to take such action in regard to the complaints as it considers appropriate;
(e) to protect the public against abuse of power and maladministration by State and public institutions and by officers of those institutions;
(f) to investigate the conduct of any authority or person, where it is alleged that any of the human rights and freedoms set out in the Declaration of Rights has been violated by that authority or person;
(g) to secure appropriate redress, including recommending the prosecution of offenders, where human rights or freedoms have been violated;
(h) to direct the Commissioner-General of Police to investigate cases of suspected criminal violations of human rights or freedoms and to report to the Commission on the results of any such investigation;
(i) to recommend to Parliament effective measures to promote human rights and freedoms;
(j) to conduct research into issues relating to human rights and freedoms and social justice; and
(k) to visit and inspect—
(i) prisons, places of detention, refugee camps and related facilities; and
(ii) places where mentally disordered or intellectually handicapped persons are detained;
in order to ascertain the conditions under which persons are kept there, and to make recommendations regarding those conditions to the Minister responsible for administering the law relating to those places.
(2) The Commissioner-General of Police must comply with any directive given to him or her by the Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission under subsection (1)(h). (Sec. 243)

The independent Commissions have the following general objectives in addition to those given to them individually—
(a) to support and entrench human rights and democracy;
… (Sec. 233)

The following are the independent Commissions—
…
(b) the Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission;
… (Sec. 232)