In July 2021, the United Nations granted CERC special consultative status with the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), on the recommendation of the Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations, made up of 19 member states. The status is not tied to a funded project: it is the framework for CERC’s work at the United Nations, and it serves the goal of its 2017–2021 strategy to build and support partnerships and coalitions that fight corruption more effectively.
Four years after its founding in Uvira, South Kivu, CERC earned the status after a rigorous application and a thorough vetting of its governance and financial systems and of its credibility in its field. Its record includes:
- a Household Corruption Perception Survey of around 980 people in 7 territories of South Kivu in 2017;
- 810 students in 54 Integrity Clubs trained between 2017 and 2020, who obtained an average fix rate of 32% of the problems they reported;
- membership of the UNCAC Coalition since November 2020.
Consultative status gives access to ECOSOC and its subsidiary bodies, to the UN human rights mechanisms and to special events of the President of the General Assembly. Organisations with special status can attend the Council’s meetings and circulate statements. For CERC, whose work straddles corruption and human rights, it will make advocacy at the UN easier and open high-level sessions.
“CERC is very grateful for this recognition and the opportunities it presents for our global advocacy work. We will use this Consultative Status to strengthen our work championing anti-corruption, human rights and governance in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.”
The work has already started. In June 2021, the UNCAC Coalition commissioned CERC to conduct the civil society parallel assessment of the DRC’s implementation of the UN Convention against Corruption, covering Chapter II (preventive measures) and Chapter V (asset recovery). Since 11 June, the team has been meeting state and non-state actors to assess how these provisions are applied in law and in practice.
The relationship is reciprocal. Under ECOSOC resolution 1996/31, CERC will report to the Committee on NGOs every four years on its contributions to the work of the United Nations, grounded in the experience of the young people it works with.
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