[afnog] AfriNIC-I meeting report

Fri Jun 4 18:14:53 EAT 2004

Dear Colleagues,

The AfriNIC-I meeting was held on 23 - 24 May 2004 in Dakar (Senegal)
at NGOR DIARAMA hotel. This meeting was the first public policy
meeting of the emerging African Internet Registry. There were 80
participants from 30 different countries including actual LIRs,
AfriNIC founding members, supporting organizations and representatives
from RIRs, ICANN and various governments.

The meeting started on Sunday afternoon at 15:30 with a speech from
the IT special adviser of the president of Senegal, Mr. Ousman Sy,
followed by a word of welcome delivered by the chairman of AfriNIC
Board of Trustees Dr. Nii Quaynor.

KEY POINTS

The meeting as a first public policy meeting was focused on the
proposed set of policies that will govern AfriNIC allocation in its
service region and its Annual General Meeting where a new board was
elected.

The first day of the meeting was reserved for updates from the
community and AfriNIC status while the second day was split between
policy discussions and the AGM (afternoon).

AfriNIC STATUS UPDATE

After a brief recall on AfriNIC background and its recent activities
by Dr. Nii Quaynor, the acting Chairman of the Board, Mr. Adiel
Akplogan gave an update on AfriNIC activities since January 2004. His
report included AfriNIC's institution in the different hosting
countries with a focus on South Africa and Mauritius, the countries
scheduled for the first phase of AfriNIC's setup.

The presentations made by both Dr. Nii Quaynor and Adiel Akplogan are
available at:

http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/welcome.pdf

http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/status_update_adiel23052004.pdf 

According to Adiel Akplogan, AfriNIC has made very sensitive progress
since May 2003. The Phase 0 of the transition plan which is related to
technical and administrative preparations for AfriNIC operations to
Start (co-evaluation of requests with RIRs) is almost complete. The
presentation of the full transition plan can be found at:

http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/transition_plan_adiel23052004.pdf

Adiel also indicated that the next milestone for AfriNIC now is to
apply for recognition from ICANN. He eassured the meeting that
everything will be done to make it happen as quickly as possible.

JOINT RIR STATICS AND UPDATE FROM THE INTERNATIONAL COMUNITY

The second part of the afternoon of 23rd May was dedicated to updates
from representatives of the International community (RIRs, NRO, ASO,
ICANN).

Presentations made include the joint statistics of IP numbers
allocation around the different regions, including a compiled
statistic of Africa region's allocations,

http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/AfriNIC-1-joint-rir-stats-apr-04.pdf

There were also presentations from representatives of different RIRs
on activity updates in their regions and in the African region they
cover. Their presentations were followed by an update on the NRO.

APNIC - 
http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/afrinic-1-apnic-report.pdf

LACNIC - 
http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/Afrinic-I_lacnic_report.pdf

RIPE NCC - 
http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/NCC%20AfriNIC%20I.pdf

NRO - 
http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/AfriNIC%20I%20nro-update.pdf

The first day of the meeting was ended by a presentation from ICANN
Vice-president Paul Verhoef. He gave an update on ICANN activities and
expressed ICANN support to AfriNIC and its availability to be able
support any activity in our region intending to increase awareness on
Internet self-governance process and the role of different
stakeholders in the process.

POLICY DISCUSSIONS

The morning of Monday 24th was dedicated to discussions on AfriNIC
policies: IPv4, IPv6, ASN and reverse delegation. The policy
discussions w preceded by two presentations on 'IPv4 life time' and
problem of intensive usage of NAT.

http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/afrinic1-apnic-address-lifetime.pdf 

http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/nat_is_evil_24052004.pdf
The Policy discussions started with a brief presentation by Ernest
Byaruhanga about the policy development process proposed for our
region. He said that the process is composed of 6 steps starting with
the policy proposal and ending with the final adoption by the
Board. The full process can be found at:

http://www.afrinic.net/policies/afpol-pdp200401-001.htm

Policies Presentation:

IPv4:
http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/policy_IPv4_proposal_ernest24052004.pdf 

IPv6:
http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/policy_IPv4_proposal_ernest24052004.pdf 

ASN:
http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/policy_asn_proposal_ernest24052004.pdf 

Reverse delegation:
http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/policy_in.addr.arpa_proposal_adiel24052004.pdf 

After each presentation the floor was given to the community to
comment on these policies.

Many practical questions and comments were received especially about
the transition from the actual LIR status to the AfriNIC's one for
those already operating a local registry.

At the end there was a global consensus on all of them.

AGM

The AfriNIC Annual general meeting was held in the afternoon of May
24th. There were two main focuses for the AGM:

1- Adoption of different Organizational documents
2- Election of a new Board.

AFRINIC ADMNISTRATION DOCUMENTS

Three presentations were made in this area. The first one was related
to the proposed amendment to AfriNIC original bylaws to comply with
Mauritius Company Act and the final structure of the Organization.

AMMENDMENT TO THE ORIGINAL BYLAWS

Four important changes were proposed:

1. The status of the company as registered in Mauritius (Company
limited by Guaranty)
2. Change of 'Board of Trustees' to 'Board of Directors'
3. Change the way the 7th member is appointed
4. Board members seat numbers for election purposes.

The presentation made by Alan Barrett on the subject is available on line:

http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/agm_bylaws_24052004.pdf

All the proposed changes were endorsed and adopted by all the members
present.

AfriNIC will now be governed by the article of constitution available
at: www.afrinic.net/bylawstexte.htm.

BUDGET FOR 2004

To comply with the new article of constitution and the previous
bylaws, AfriNIC project manager Adiel Akplogan presented AfriNIC
budget for 2004.

http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/agm_budget_and_fees_schedule24052004.pdf

There were some concerns expressed by the community on the proposed
budget especially the administrative one. There were questions about
the cost of translating AfriNIC documents and website into languages
other than English, if the amount of money provisioned for training
will be enough to fulfil one of AfriNIC's goals (which is to make
awareness on IP resource management on the continent) and if that
budget can really cover all the travel expenses including Board
members travel to achieve that goal.

Adiel Akplogan explained that this budget is mostly built based on
expected funding from various donors. The budget presented reflects
our expectations and covers the most important activities needed at
this stage. For instance he explained that translation is something
AfriNIC is looking at very closely, but to make the bootstrap process
faster and easier he thought that it would make more sense to allocate
available resources to strengthen the organization and get the formal
recognition. The 2004 budget is mostly designed to allow the
organization to achieve its main goals for this year in compliance
with ICP-2 criteria and get the formal recognition as a Regional
Registry by ICANN.

The representative of Agence Intergouvernementale de la Francophonie
with the French minister of Foreign Affairs used that opportunity to
express their willingness to support AfriNIC translation activities as
they are already providing the translation of the current meeting.
Finally the Budget was adopted through consensus by all the members
present at the meeting.

FEES SCHEDULE

Following to the budget presentation, the Project Manager presented
AfriNIC's Fees Schedule. The proposal was based on splitting of AfriNIC
membership in to 5 categories which are:

  # Extra small
  # Small
  # Medium
  # Large
  # Extra large

These different categories are determined by the total amount of IPv4
address allocated to the LIRs. Moreso, there are 5 other categories
applied to End-User resource holders (companies which are not ISP or
Operators and use the allocation/assignment for their own
Infrastructure only) including ASN only holders.

  The full fees schedule is available at:

http://www.afrinic.net/documents/membership/afadm-fee200403-draft01a.pdf

and the presentation made at:

http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/agm_budget_and_fees_schedule24052004.pdf

This presentation opened a very long discussion about the fees that
AfriNIC proposes to charge its Extra Small members. The main concern
came from a few South African members present. They expressed their
concern about the price which seems to be higher than what they are
paying now with ARIN. Most of them suggested AfriNIC to increase the
price of the bigger LIR and decrease the smaller one.

It was explained by the PM that these prices are not higher if we do
not consider the Extra-small category applied by ARIN for micro
allocation. It is important to note that the Micro allocation policy
doesn't mean the same thing in AfriNIC region. In our region there is
a difference between end-user allocation (non-ISP) and Extra-small
category. The Project Manager also explained that AfriNIC is
non-for-profit organization which at least needs to be sustainable and
stand on its own feet like all the other RIRs. Therefore, it needs to
secure necessary funds to face the cost of its operations at the end
of the incubation period (2 years). As also explained in the
presentation, the fees are subject to revision each year by the board
with Members' endorsement. It is very important for us to make some
sacrifice at the beginning to build a sustainable organization. "As
soon as we are more financially strong we can look at the way to
revise the price" state the PM. Going into the same direction as the
PM, the CEO of RIPE NCC explained that the most important thing now
for AfriNIC is to ensure sustainability.

After a long discussion and questions on the fees issues, the chair of
the AGM (Dr. Nii Quaynor) asked if it makes sense to endorse the Fees
schedule for now and see in the future how to take into account the
concerns expressed by the community. A large majority of the meeting
agreed to move ahead with those prices as they are. There was one
member against (ZANet - William Stucke) and one abstention (Unoforum
ZA) represented by one of the Interim board member - Theo Kramer.

AFRINIC MEMBERSHIP PROCESS

The community was also updated with the process AfriNIC will use to
approve membership and allocate resources. The process is mainly split
in 3 steps for Members-only and 6 for LIRs.

For LIRs they are:

1. Completing the AfriNIC Membership Application Form (affrm-ma200403-draft01a)
2. Signing the Registration Service Agreement (RSA - aflgl-rsa200404-draft01a)
3. Payment of Fees (afadm-fee200403-draft01a - afadm-bil200404-draft01a)
4. Evaluation of First Allocation request
5. Approval of first allocation
6. Evaluation of first sub-allocation (Optional)

For Member-only, the process will end after step 3 when the candidate
fills and sends the membership form with the Member-only agreement
followed by the payment of the associated fee.

Presentation was made by Adiel Akplogan based on the diagram available at:

http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/agm_membership_process_24052004.pdf 

RESOLUTIONS FROM 22nd MAY BOARD MEETIING

To close the first part of the AGM and introduce the election of the
new board, the chairman of the acting board read the resolutions taken
during the last Board Meeting held in Dakar on 22nd May and announced
the official dissolution of the Interim Board.

www.afrinic.net/documents/bot/Resolutions-Dakar22052004.pdf

BOARD ELECTION PROCESS

To comply with the new constitution and the board election process
previously posted and agreed to be used
(http://www.afrinic.net/bot/afbot-elp200404-001.htm) the project
manager proposed a resolution to AfriNIC's full members allowing the
extension of the voting rights to category of organization indicated
in the election process.

The Question was: "Do you agree to extend the voting rights to
organizations that are already established as LIRs and those which had
expressed their support by a writing letter sent to AfriNIC?."

We got 5/5 YES to that question (only 5 on the 7 full registered
AfriNIC members on May 24th 2004 were present in Dakar) meaning that
the election process can be followed as it is and the right to vote is
extended to:

a - Any organization that formally expresses its support to AfriNIC
(No Proxy allowed)
b - Any already established LIR/ISP (reg-ID and Member ID required)
c - Any organization that fills the membership form and pays the
membership-only fee before the AGM.

Prior to the AGM , the project Manager and members of the Board
election committee presented the election process as proposed and used
for the 2004 election. The presentation can be found at:

http://www.afrinic.net/meetings/afrinic1/presentations/election_process_adiel24052004.pdf 

The election was run to elect representative of the 6 sub-regions in
Africa (Northern, western, Central, Eastern, Southern and Indian
Ocean). According to the new constitution, board members will be
renewed by pair each year to allow continuity. The pairs are
determined at the start-up point (2004 AGM) by compiling the number of
LIR per sub-region (conf. www.afrinic.net/bylawstexte.htm and
http://www.afrinic.net/bot/membershipperregion.htm):

Seat 1 and 2: Northern and Western sub-regions
seat 3 and 4: Southern and Eastern sub regions
Seat 5 and 6: Central and Indian Ocean sub-regions

According to the adopted process the terms of these representatives
for this first election will depend on their seat number. So we have:

a) for 3-year terms: Seat 1 and 2 (primary and alternate)
b) for 2-year terms: Seat 3 and 4 (primary and alternate)
c) for 1-year terms: Seat 5 and 6 (primary and alternate)

For the next election, for each pair, the term will be the regular
term as mentioned in the constitution: 3 years.

THE ELECTION

The election took place after each candidate present at the meeting
introduced himself to the community and stated his motivation for
running for the board position.

During the presentation period:

** M. Yawo NOAGBODJI candidate from Western Africa sub-region resigned
to run for the election and asked the members to vote for Pierre
Dandjinou as from his point of view, Pierre better represents what is
needed for AfriNIC at this stage.

** M. Pierre Mutumbe Kansangedia candidate from Central Africa and also
Interim board member also expressed his willingness not to be
considered for the Primary position and asked members to vote for his
colleague Didier R. Kasole.

** Kamak Okba candidate for Northern sub-region who was not present
asked Rachida Jouari to be his proxy for the election.

32 persons present at the meeting were able to vote by fulfilling one
of the voting rights criteria. From them only 30 expressed their vote.

The result after the vote and the ballot counted by the BEC was:

* Northern
Kamal Okba: 24
Moktar Hamidi: 5
One abstention

* Western sub-region
Pierre Dandjinou: 21
Adesola Bickersteth:0
Sunday Folayan: 9
Yawo Noagbodji: Resigned for Pierre Dandjinou

* Southern
Grant Walker: 0
Alan Barrett: 18
Alan Levin: 10
Theo Kramer: 2

* Indian Ocean
Vivi Padayatchy: 19
Kenneth Yiptong: 11

* Central
Didier R. Kasole: 29
Pierre mutumbe: decided to serve as Alternat
On abstention

* Estern
Charle Musisi: 7
Badru Ntege : 6
Brian Longwe : 17

According to these numbers, the new elected board is composed as Follows :

Kamal Okba (N)     Pierre Dandjinou (W) Alan Barett (S)  Viv Padayatchy (IO)
Moktar Hamidi (N)  Sunday Folayan (W)   Alan Levin (S)   Kenny Yiptong (IO)

Didier R. Kasole (C)
Pierre Mutumbe (C)

-- Congratulations to the newly elected Board --

After the result of the election was announced to the community by
Raul Echeberria (member of the BEC and CEO of LACNIC), the 6 newly
elected board members with their alternate were presented to the
audience.

FIRST BOARD MEETING

The new elected board had its first meeting just after the
election. Two resolutions were taken during the meeting:

001 - The board resolved that, as result of a unanimous agreement of
its members, Mr. Pierre Dandjinou from West Africa will chair the
board during the duration of its mandate.

002 - The board resolved to appoint M. Adiel A. Akplogan as CEO of
AfriNIC Ltd. And according to the new article of constitution he becomes
the 7th member of the Board of Trustees where he will serve as
Secretary.

END OF THE AGM AND THE MEETING.

Before the closing session chaired by the new chairman of the board,
Adiel Akplogan gave a symbolic gift to all the leaving Interim board
members with a warm expression of gratitude to Dr. Nii Quaynor, the
former chairman of the Board for his hard work and initiative to set
up AfriNIC.

The meeting ended at 19:00 with a speech from the chairman of AfriNIC
followed by a last word from the Minister of Telecommunication of
Senegal, the hosting country.

THANKS AND GRATITUDE:

AfriNIC would like to express its full gratitude to the sponsors that
made this event a success:

o ISOC Int'l with Afilias
o Agence Intergouvernementale de la Francophonie
o ISOC Senegal the local host

Thank you all for you support and hope to work with you for a long
time.

-------- END --------

Adiel A. Akplogan