President Robert Mugabe now has absolute power until the elections to make and pass laws and amend existing ones without consultation after the dissolution of Parliament last weekend.
The Constitutional Court ruled on Thursday that polls will take place on July 31.
The dissolution of Parliament means Zimbabwe is operating with two arms of state, the executive and the judiciary.
Legally, Mugabe should also consult Cabinet before changing any laws, but he is the final authority in legislating laws and can bypass Cabinet.
But on Tuesday two sources who sit on Cabinet meetings said Mugabe had bade them farewell and said Cabinet would not sit again until after the poll.
There are now fears that Mugabe will take advantage of the situation to invoke the controversial Presidential Powers Temporary Measures Act and change legislation, including electoral laws.
Election date shock
Mugabe last month used the Presidential Powers Act to unilaterally amend the Electoral Act and declare July 31 as the election date. That move, on the eve of the extraordinary Southern African Development Community summit on Zimbabwe in Maputo, shocked his political opponents who said Parliament was still sitting and there was no justification for him to resort to using sweeping powers.
Professor Eldred Masunungure, a political science lecturer at the University of Zimbabwe, said the situation of not having a sitting Parliament is unfortunate for the country because it allowed for unilateralism at a time when the country is trying to move from "an authoritarian, closed and opaque system to a more democratic one".
"Ruling by decree is inherently undemocratic because there are no checks and balances. In our case, we have the executive and the judiciary, but none of these two pillars is elected directly, unlike Parliament, which in essence represents the people," he said.
"We have already seen the activation of the Presidential Powers Act while Parliament was active, and the fear is that there may be more proclamations, which will tilt the balance of power in favour of Mugabe and Zanu-PF."
Masunungure said, although the new Constitution says once the Electoral Act has been promulgated there are not supposed to be any amendments, the recent amendments when Parliament was sitting are good reason for concern.
"The president's decree went ahead oblivious of the existence of Parliament, so what then can stop him from making more changes?"
Mugabe's 'unilateral tendencies'
Masunungure said, under the current conditions, Mugabe should run the country in conjunction with Cabinet, but his behaviour suggests that he wants to do it alone.
"Cabinet is likely to be rendered superfluous and redundant given the unilateral tendencies exhibited by Mugabe," he said.
In the past, Parliament has dissolved at midnight before the poll date, but the life of the seventh Parliament ended while the Global Political Agreement partners were still haggling over election dates and over the implementation of reforms.
Deputy Justice Minister Obert Gutu, who belongs to the MDC-T, said although Mugabe can abuse the Presidential Powers Act to change legislation unilaterally, the presidential powers could also be used for positive reforms.
"If all parties, through their negotiators, agree on specific reforms such as the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act, the Public Order and Security Act and other legislation that is relevant to elections, the Presidential Powers Act can be used effectively and for the good of the country," said Gutu.
"The presidential powers are supposed to be used in exceptional circumstances and for the good of the nation. The problem though is that they can be used negatively like we saw with the declaration of election dates and amendments to the Electoral Act."
Presidential powers
The Presidential Powers Act was enacted in 1987 when Mugabe became executive president after the abolition of the ceremonial presidency. In past polls Mugabe has used the Act.
On the eve of the 2002 presidential elections, for example, he used his presidential powers to introduce a raft of amendments to the Electoral Act, which influenced the running and outcome of the polls. This included the banning of postal votes and limiting the number of polling stations in urban centres.
In 2008, Mugabe amended electoral laws again, this time to allow for the presence of police officers in polling stations. The opposition complained that this was a tactic that would be used to intimidate the electorate, especially in rural areas.