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Background for Developing an Anti-bribery Management System Standard
Governments all over the world have made progress in addressing
bribery through international agreements such as the Organization for Economic
Co-operation and Development (OECD) Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign
Public Officials in International Business Transactions (*) and the United
Nations Convention against Corruption (**) and through their national laws
(***).
In most jurisdictions, it is an offence for individuals to engage
in bribery and there is a growing trend to make organizations, as well as
individuals, liable for bribery.
(*) For more details on OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions, please CLICK HERE for OECD link.
(**) United Nations Convention against Corruption 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 vast majority of United Nations Member States are parties to the
Convention. For more details on United
Nations Convention against Corruption, please CLICK HERE for UN Convention link. Text of
the Convention may be downloaded from this link. UN Secretary-General Kofi A.
Annan says, “The Convention introduces a comprehensive set of standards,
measures and rules that all countries can apply in order to strengthen their
legal and regulatory regimes to fight corruption. It calls for preventive
measures and the criminalization of the most prevalent forms of corruption in
both public and private sectors. And it makes a major breakthrough by requiring
Member States to return assets obtained through corruption to the country from
which they were stolen.”
(***) All over the world, the governments have framed
anti-corruption legislation. The legal provisions of primary anti-corruption
legislation in India are provided in the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 and
the Prevention of Corruption (Amendment) Act, 2018. The legislation in India
criminalizes, among other things, the taking and giving ‘undue advantage’ to
‘public servants.’ Both individuals and companies are liable to be punished for
an offence under the PCA (PCA = Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 + Prevention
of Corruption (Amendment) Act, 2018).
One of the measures adopted in UN Convention against Corruption is
promoting the development of standards and procedures designed to safeguard the
integrity of relevant private entities, including codes of conduct for the
correct, honourable and proper performance of the activities of business and
all relevant professions and the prevention of conflicts of interest, and for
the promotion of the use of good commercial practices among businesses and in
the contractual relations of businesses with the State. (Reference: Text of the
United Nations Convention against Corruption, Page 14)
As we know the law alone is not sufficient to solve the problem of corruption or bribery. Organizations have a responsibility to proactively contribute to combating bribery. International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has developed ISO 37001:2016 standard titled as ‘Anti-bribery management systems – Requirements with guidance for use). The committee responsible for the development of ISO 37001:2016 is Project Committee ISO/PC 278, Anti-bribery management systems. ISO 37001:2016 is the first edition of the standard and was published by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) on 15 October 2016. In India, Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) has published a national Standard IS/ISO 37001:2016. You can obtain a copy of this standard from the sales counter of BIS or purchase online from BIS Website.
The problem of combating bribery can be achieved by an
anti-bribery management system, for which ISO 37001:2016 standard document is
intended to provide, and through leadership commitment to establishing a
culture of integrity, transparency, openness and compliance.
Let us hope for the best and make our efforts to establish and
implement an Anti-bribery Management System (ABMS) in organizations as per ISO
37001:2016 standard.
Do you have any relevant questions to implement ABMS? Please let
me know.
Best wishes,
KRS
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