There is increasing concern about the behavior of corporate entities and their supervision, particularly with regard to the phenomenon of corruption.
To this end, the General Regime for the Prevention of Corruption was established by Decree-Law no.º 109-E/2021, of December 9th, which came into force on June 7th, 2022, applicable to Corporate Entities employing 50 or more workers, with the above regime taking effect on June 7th, 2023 for Corporate Entities employing more than 250 workers, and for those employing between 50 and 250 workers, it only took effect a year later, on June 7th, 2024, and the aforementioned Decree-Law is currently fully in force, with the legal consequences.
Therefore, Decree-Law no. 109-E/2021, of December 9th, in addition to creating the National Anti-Corruption Mechanism (MENAC) as an administrative entity with legal personality under public law, established the general regime applicable to the prevention of corruption and the respective sanctioning regime.
Although there are some entities that have similar control regimes, such regimes do not meet the requirements currently in force, and we believe that the implementation of such a mechanism should be carried out by an entity external to the Corporate Entity itself, in order to ensure greater effectiveness, transparency and impartiality in its application.
In this regard, the non-implementation of the system in question could have administrative consequences that are set out in the aforementioned legislation.
In addition, the courts are currently more aware of the problem of corruption and the mechanisms to combat it, particularly with regard to the implementation of anti-corruption measures, and there are already a number of court rulings that take into account the existence of a genuine compliance program.