The United Nations Convention against Corruption was signed by 178 countries and entered into force on 14 December 2005. South Africa ratified the Convention on 22 November 2004.
The United Nations Convention against Corruption (UNCAC) is the only legally binding universal anti-corruption instrument. The Convention’s far-reaching approach and the mandatory character of many of its provisions make it a unique tool for developing a comprehensive response to a global problem.
The Convention covers five main areas: prevention, criminalisation and law enforcement measures, international cooperation, asset recovery and technical assistance and information exchange.
The UNCAC covers many different forms of corruption, such as trading in influence, abuse of power, and various acts of corruption in the private sector. A further significant development was the inclusion of a specific chapter of the Convention dealing with the recovery of assets, a major concern for countries that pursue the assets of former leaders and other officials accused or found to have engaged in corruption.
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UNODC eLearning
On 2 February 2016, the UNODC Global eLearning Programme launched a new Anti-Corruption Course in its Learning Management System. The course consists of two eLearning modules –“Introduction to Anti-corruption” and “Advanced Anti-corruption: Prevention of Corruption”. The course has been designed by experts from the Corruption and Economic Crime Branch of UNODC and has the objective to improve the learners’ understanding of the provisions of the United Nations Convention against Corruption (UNCAC). Any member of the general public can register for these modules at the following link: https://golearn.unodc.org.
Full members of the ICFP will earn 3 CPD credits when submitting the UN certificate of completion on their ICFP profile.