Pastor Peters Osawaru Omoragbon, President of Nurses Across the Borders and First Fellow from Nigeria to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers [ICANN) has advocated the promotion of the interest of Regional At-Large Organisation (AFRALO) which is the home of the individual Internet User Community for the African Region, saying there is need to increase its voice within the ecosystem of ICANN.
Omoragbon made this advocacy as part of his intervention at the African Engagement Forum 2023 which took place at Marriot Hotel, Accra, Ghana from July 23 -27 2023.
The engagement came up a day after the meeting of the General Assembly of the African Regional at Large Organization (AFRALO) under ICANN with over 54 delegates from Africa representing 71 At Large Structures ( ALSecs).
He said “I don’t know if there are plans for the ICANN Board to extend sponsorship of those that attended the AFRALO GA to be at the ICANN Rwanda Summit in June 2024. What am I trying to bring out here? Any region ICANN appears to be having or hosting their event, one major way of inclusivity is to first of all encourage and enable members of ICANN constituency in that region to be fully involved because they are the ones that promotes ICANN activities within the region, so if you are going to take this to Asia, the RALOS or the ALSecs within the Asian region should be given the first priority to be part of it, so if it is coming up in Rwanda efforts should also be made to ensure AFRALO members should also be there by increasing their participation, that will also help to enhance the voice of Africans, ditto for Asia, Latin Americans and the rest in the interest of ICANN.”
He commended ICANN for increasing Africa’s participation in their affairs but also called for more inclusivity in all its engagements. “We should commend ICANN’s efforts in trying to increase the involvement of participations of African community within ICANN ecosystem.”
Omoragbon therefore explained what he felt should be the modality for ensuring that Africans are well represented. “If we are to increase the voice of African communities within the ICANN ecosystem, there is also the need to also increase the participation of the various stakeholders within ICANN, and what do I mean? AFRALO represents the various interests within ICANN in Africa and the GA that is being sponsored by ICANN is a welcome development, the last was in J’bourg, but my concern is that having a GA and this African Engagement Forum immediately after the GA without the active participation of the AFRALO that constitutes an integral part of ICANN; that to me defeats the purpose. What do I mean? The GA ended yesterday, so majority of the African delegates to the GA have to depart yesterday! What ICANN should have done was to increase their stay by just a day, so that we have a full participation at this African Engagement Forum. So the question is, as desirable as the GA is for AFRALO, where is the engagement if those organisations putting up their best in Africa for ICANN within AFRALO are absent from programmes like this? That is ICANN shooting itself on the foot. If you are having an African Engagement, merge it together with the General Assembly, by making everything inclusive.” If there is no GA but there is an ICANN Summit in any region make the RALO in that region fully participatory.
Omoragbon congratulated the organization and appreciated the group for what it has been doing so far with the series of Stakeholder Engagement all over the world.
