DotConnectAfrica

Type:	Non-Profit
Industry:	Internet
Founder(s):	Sophia Bekele
Headquarters:	I/F River Court 6th Denis Street Port Louis
Country:	Mauritius
Website:	DotConnectAfrica
Blog:	DCA Blog
Key People
Sophia Bekele, Founder & Executive Director

DotConnectAfrica (DCA) is a not-for-profit, non-partisan organization based in Mauritius, Africa.[ It's main objective is to become the sponsoring organization and the registry operator of the DotAfrica generic top level domain name (gTLD). The organization's maintains offices in Ethiopia, Kenya and United States.

Background

DCA was founded in 2008 by Sophia Bekele and serves as executive director of the organization. Her purpose is to support the .africa initiative and to help provide solutions to the internet policy divides in the African Region and be connected and at paced with the innovations of the Internet and Communications Technology worldwide. In 2009, organization started its campaign to gather support for the .africa initiative by conducting forums in different universities and international conferences including the Golden Gate University, UC Berkeley, Stanford University and Sacramento State University, World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), United Nations Development of Economics & Social Affairs (UNDESA) and United Nations Public Administration Network(UNPAN).

Mission

DCA aims to accomplish the following missions:

• Become the sponsor and operator of the .africa gTLD and establish it as regional internet domain name space with a global recognition dedicated to the needs of the Pan-African and African community.
• Reinvest surplus of the registry business in socio-technological development projects significant to the Pan-Africa and African community.
• Operate an effective and technically advanced TLD registry through the initiative of not-for-profit organization.

DotConnectAfrica Initiatives for DotAfrica TLD

Endorsements to DCA

The proposal to develop the DotAfrica TLD was first introduced by Sophia Bekele to the African Members of the ICANN Board and different African organizations of the ICANN community during the ICANN 28 meeting in Lisbon, Portugal in 2007. She emphasized the importance of the .africa domain name for the benefit of the African region’s internet development and it will serve as global identity for African internet users just like .asia and .eu. Furthermore, Bekele pointed out to her colleagues that the DotAfrica initiative is in compliance with the objective and policies of international organizations to enhance the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) of the African continent including the WSIS, African Union and United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA). During the ICANN 32 International ICANN Public Meeting, Bekele officially announced her bid to apply for the DotAfrica TLD through DotConnectAfrica. The organization received endorsement and support from the African Union Commission (AUC) through its’ chairman Jean Ping on August 27, 2009. Ping expressed that AUA is willing to assist DCA in coordinating the DotAfrica initiative to the African ministers and governments. In addition, Amina Salima, head if the African Union Mission' in Washington also supported DCA’s DotAfrica initiative. Salima said, "one of the objectives of the African Union Mission in the USA is to mobilize the African Diaspora efforts. Towards this end, the AU mission would like to express support for the .africa initiative". Abdoulie Janneh, UN under-secretary-general and Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission of Africa (ECA) also sent a letter of endorsement to DCA stating the following, "I write to express my support on behalf of ECA. This is a worthwhile initiative that will contribute substantially to helping Africa bridge the digital divide. It will certainly help the continent to derive similar benefits from the successful experience from the European Union which has the .eu domain and that of Asia with its .asia domain.” Other high ranking officials from different governments in Africa also supported DCA’s initiative. During the ICANN 37 Meeting at Nairobi, Kenya in 2010, the members of the Nairobi technical community who attended the public forum also expressed their support to DCA.

AUC Retracts Endorsement

The African Union Commission issued a statement on May 12, 2011 retracting the statement of endorsement issued by Chairman Jean Ping to DCA. The AUC explained that during the Member States meeting, the African Union Ministers in-charge of the Communications and Information Technologies decided to allow competition among organizations interested to sponsor and operate the DotAfrica TLD. The AUC also clarified that it did not support nor endorse any individual or organization and announced that entities interested must submit their Expression of Interest (EOI), which will served as the Commission’s basis for endorsement and selection.

DCA criticized AUC’s statement and plan to implement the EOI submission competition process before providing its endorsement to the DotAfrica application with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. DCA said that AUC’s objective for accountability and transparency is “hollow and unbelievable” because the Commission did not even acknowledge the previous endorsement issued by Chairman Ping. Furthermore, DCA pointed out that the EOI process is bias because the AU Task Force already expressed its support for AfTLD during the 2011 annual African ccTLD event in Ghana. DCA encouraged all organizations to disregard the AU EOI process and asked AUC to stop it.

Continuous Promotional Campaign at ICANN Meetings & Other Forums

DCA continued to campaign and promote its bid to sponsor and operate the DotAfrica gTLD particurly during ICANN Meetings. During the ICANN 38 in Brussels, DCA served as one of the event sponsors. The organization also sponsored a delegation from Africa to become part of the policy debate that would help shape the position of the African community regarding the issue on the implementation of ICANN's new gTLD expansion program.

During the ICANN 39 in Cartagena, Columbia on December 2010, Bekele shared her statement during the public forum urging the ICANN Board not to delay the applcation process for new gTLDs and enumerated the three key principles that will serve as the foundation of DCA's governance to the DotAfrica gTLD. These principles include: Branding the African continent's product and services through the DotAfrica gTLD to inform people around the world about the positive things Africa has to offer, DCA created “generation.africa” as a theme to empower the youth in Africa, adapt and use the power of the internet; and to shift the industry from US market of .com and .org to Africa empowered by the dotafrica registry, which will be located in the continent.

On March 2011, during the ICANN 40 Meeting in San Francisco, DCA and its delegation introduced its Yes to DotAfrica Campaign. During the event, Bekele spoke to registry vendors about DCA's EOI to apply for .africa. She claimed that majority of the ICANN community support her initiative. Bekele also said that DCA welcomes all African internet agencies and international partners that are willing to collaborate and provide guidance in the bid to apply for the DotAfrica TLD.

DCA also attended the ICANN 41 meeting in Singapore on June 2011 and ICANN 42 in Dakar, Senegal on October of 2011 respectively. During the two previous events, Bekele took the opportunity to promote the Yes to DotAfrica campaign. In Senegal, the organization provided an exhibit to participants featuring its vision for the DotAfrica gTLD.

During the Internet Governance Forum in Kenya on July 29, 2010, DCA urged the participants to support its application as the sponsor and registry operator for the DotAfrica gTLD. During the event, Bekele informed the attendees that DCA already submitted its EOI to ICANN. According to her,"After the high level endorsments we received as per the application, we are now in the process of reaching out to the technical community to gain support based on the merit and the benefits of the initiative, and hoping that such forums as IGF would create a neutral platform for debate and raising issues with the .africa domain name and internet governance." She also said that the DCA governance model is based on the Kenya Network Information Center's (KeNIC) multi-stakeholder model.

DCA Heated Rivalry Againts AfTLD

The rivalry between DCA and AfTLD, an association of ccTLD domain name managers and sponsoring organizations in Africa to gain the endorsement of the African Union Commission to serve as the operator and sponsoring organization of the DotAfrica gTLD turned nasty. DCA alleged that AfTLD is corrupt and it is using double dealing to unfairly get the endorsement from AUC. In response, AfTLD claimed that DCA is using intimidation to succeed. When the African Union announced that a Task Force was created and delegated to choose the right organization to be endorsed by the AUC for the DotAfrca project for the ICANN application, DCA reacted negatively and accused that the Task Force was "established in order to disingenuously facilitate insider help for AfTLD’s Expression of Interest to the AU and prospective bid to ICANN." In addition, DCA claimed that some of the members of the Task Force including Pierre Dandjinou and Nii Quaynor are "advisors and confederates of AfTLD," and strongly emphasized that their ties are "unwholesome and foster corruption, nepotism, abuse of office, and large-scale illegality." Furthermore, DCA launched a campaign against Nii Quaynor.

DCA Preliminary Advisory Board & Team Members

Some of the individuals who serve as part of the organization's preliminary advisory board and team include:

Advisory Board

• Njeri Rionge- CEO and Founder, Ignite Consulting & Investment Limited, and Director and Co-founder, Wananchi Online Limited. She was also member of the ICANN Board from 2003-2008
• Prof. S. Subbiah-Chairman and Co-Founder of i-DNS.net International Inc.
• Anitha Soni- CEO of ASA Tourism Services Group
• Zaid Ali- Founding Member/President of ISOC SF Bay Chapter and Principal Network Engineer at LinkedIn

Team Members

• Mr. Nebiyu Yosef- Project Coordinator
• Tidjani Jeff Tall- Fundraising/Strategy Consulting
• Mekdes Teklesgie - Outreach
• Hailue Mengiste- Marketing
• Lealem Kebede- Sales
• Ephrem Beyene- IDN/Language
• Demissie D. Asseffa- Program
• Thomas Kumanzi- Press, Editorial
• Yusuf Mandour- Registry Liason
• Amy Cunningham- US, Marketing

Top-Level Domain

Internet Governance Forum

Country code top-level domain

Internationalized Domain Name