Big turn-out at ICANN conference
By Haru Mutasa
Highway Africa News Agency (HANA)

Over 600 delegates are attending the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) conference in Cape Town, the fourth time such a meeting has been held in Africa.

Addressing journalists last night, ICANN CEO and president Dr Paul Twomey stressed the need for continual cooperation between stakeholders on Internet related matters.

“This meeting aims to strengthen partnerships between all stake holders involved in Africa-related Internet issues,” said Twomey, “and it is encouraging to see an impressive turnout from the Government Advisory Council (GAC) which says a lot about the African involvement at this conference.

The GAC
Issues to be covered throughout the week include, among other things, new generic Top Level Domain (gTLD) strategies, implementing policies concerning internet governance and discussions on how the ongoing United Nations’ internet governance process could affect Africa’s internet users.

“ICANN has just appointed Frank Fowlie as the new internet ombudsman,” said ICANN chairman Dr Vint Cerf, “If the board's actions are in contradiction to the by-laws it has to follow, he (Fowlie) accepts the complaints and reports his findings to the board.”

Cerf said the Cape Town meeting will also unveil ICANN’s three year strategic plan and shed light on the status of the African Network Information Network (AfriNIC), the soon to be implemented Regional Internet number Registry (RIR) for Africa.

“ICANN has received the application for AfriNIC and we have granted a provisional relationship for the body to act as a potential Regional Internet Registry (RIR). We are all very excited by this and hope that in the first quarter of next year the final application will have been received.”

The ICP2 system, similar to that used in the Latin America, is being used to assess and facilitate the implementation of AfriNIC.

The week-long Internet conference ends this Sunday and Twomey hopes stronger relationships between ICANN, governments and various stakeholders will have been forged to improve and better manage Africa’s Internet climate.