Important court ruling for the Internet in South Africa

High drama gripped Africa’s Internet Registry today as the Supreme Court of Mauritius heard an appeal against an injunction blocking the election of a new board of directors, and set it aside.

Following the ruling, the African Network Information Centre (Afrinic) election committee immediately notified members that electronic voting begins today, Wednesday, 18 June 2025.

The date for in-person voting at a venue in Mauritius remains unchanged — Monday,  23 June 2025.

Afrinic’s election committee and official receiver were interdicted from proceeding with the vote by the Tanzanian Internet Service Providers Association (Tispa).

E-voting was originally scheduled to start this past Monday, 16 June, and close on the same day as the in-person vote. It is unclear if the e-voting period will be extended due to the injunction.

Afrinic is the Regional Internet Registry for Africa and the Indian Ocean region, one of five global bodies tasked with managing the allocation of Internet resources.

These include precious Internet Protocol (IP) addresses, specifically IP version 4 (IPv4) addresses, which are the reason Afrinic finds itself in its current predicament.

Afrinic finds itself without a board or CEO after trying to reclaim large blocks of IP addresses it previously assigned to Cloud Innovation, a Seychelles-based Internet company that later became an IP broker.

Cloud Innovation and its allies unleashed a legal onslaught against Afrinic to prevent the loss of their resources.

This ultimately left Afrinic paralysed — without a board or CEO — opening the door for the Mauritian courts to appoint an official receiver to get the organisation back on its feet.

Predictably, this too has been the subject of controversy. A court application saw the first receiver removed before he could hold the elections.

The second receiver has also faced allegations of serving the interests of a particular group and other impropriety.

Regardless, the new receiver has moved ahead with the elections, appointing a nominations committee comprising British barristers.

After a brief nomination period, the committee produced an extensive list of candidates for Afrinic’s eight board seats.

Short profiles for each candidate are provided in documents linked to each subheading in the table below.

Recommended candidates

Although many people may find matters of Internet governance dry, a lot is at stake in these forthcoming elections.

Afrinic has been rocked by allegations of corruption and, behind the scenes, competing interest groups are manoeuvring to seize or retain control of the organisation.

Their motivations vary — from defending commercial footholds in the lucrative IP address market to advancing ideological or political agendas, or simply having control over Afrinic’s multimillion-dollar budget.

However, the common thread is clear: influence over Afrinic means power over a critical part of Africa’s internet infrastructure.

To help mitigate against the information overload and discouraging effect of dirty politics when trying to research which candidates to vote for, several organisations have put forward recommendations.

In South Africa, the national network operators group (Zanog) and the Internet Service Providers’ Association (Ispa) have published a list of recommended candidates.

“There has been considerable interest in Zanog’s position regarding the upcoming Afrinic board election,” said Zanog founding member Edrich de Lange.

“More than ever, this election is crucial — and we strongly encourage every eligible resource member to vote.”

De Lange urged members to consider which candidates were best equipped to serve the long-term interests of Afrinic and the broader Internet community.

“As a resource holder, Zanog will be participating in this election,” he stated.

“We have spent significant time reviewing the candidates to ensure that our choice reflects Zanog’s values and commitment to a healthy, community-driven Internet ecosystem.”

De Lange said the following candidates were best positioned to guide Afrinic through its current challenges and help restore it to a state of operational stability and credibility.

• Seat 1 (North Africa) — Abdelaziz Hilali
• Seat 2 (West Africa) — Emmanuel Adewale Adedokun
• Seat 3 (Indian Ocean) — Kaleem Usmani
• Seat 4 (Central Africa) — Laurent Ntumba
• Seat 5 (Southern Africa) — Carla Sanderson
• Seat 6 (East Africa) — Fiona Asonga
• Seat 7 (Non-regional) — Adewole David Ajao
• Seat 8 (Non-regional) — Ben Roberts

Ispa has concurred with Zanog’s list and has recommended the same eight candidates to its members.