The main entrance into Chikurubi Maximum Security Prison in Harare, Zimbabwe 08 October 2017. Wives, children and relatives of the more than 2 500 inmates visited the prisoners courtesy of a programme called Family week introduced by the Zimbabwe Prisons and Correctional Services to allow for the first time in Zimbabwe's prison history children and relatives to visit prisoners. EPA-EFE/Aaron Ufumeli 
The cabinet passed a private member's bill introduced last year in the National Assembly to abolish the death penalty inherited from British colonial rule.
"In view of the need to retain the deterrent element in sentencing murderers, it is expected that the new law will impose lengthy sentences without violating the right to life," the cabinet said in a statement.
"The existence of aggravating circumstances may attract life sentences."
Zimbabwe carried out its last execution in 2005.
President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who was once put on the death row during the struggle for independence against British rule, has been pushing to end the death penalty.
(Reporting by Nyasha Chingono; Editing by Anait Miridzhanian and Christina Fincher)