According to TheRegister.com, ICANN committed $40,000 to Smart Africa in 2024 through a Project Agreement that required developing a long-term vision for African internet governance. The resulting CAIGA framework proposes creating a Council of African Internet Governance Authorities that would represent Africa at global bodies and potentially supersede policy-making functions of AFRINIC, Africa’s regional internet registry. Smart Africa, representing 42 African nations with heads of state on its board, endorsed candidates in AFRINIC’s recent election where seven of eight elected directors were on their list, then linked the result to advancing CAIGA. ICANN president Kurt Lindquist published a post on November 18 attempting to distance the organization from CAIGA, saying funding doesn’t equal endorsement, but ICANN’s own Non-Commercial Stakeholder Group sent a letter the next day demanding clarification about the relationship.
The quiet coup accusation
Here’s what has internet governance experts so concerned. Nigerian network engineer Amin Dayekh called CAIGA a “quiet coup” because it could strip AFRINIC members of their decision-making power. Alice Munyua, who’s held senior positions at both Internet Society and ICANN, amplified this concern by noting CAIGA represents “a new layer of governmental and regulatory authority positioned above AFRINIC’s elected board.” Basically, we’re talking about replacing decades of bottom-up, member-driven policy making with top-down government control. And that’s a fundamental shift in how internet governance has worked since, well, forever.
ICANN’s bureaucratic dance
Now here’s where it gets messy. ICANN is trying to have it both ways. They funded the development of this framework but now claim they didn’t “preevaluate” the resulting proposal. Lindquist’s response essentially says “we gave them money but we’re not responsible for what they came up with.” But come on – when you fund an organization to develop a “long-term vision for internet governance,” what did they think was going to happen? Dayekh nailed it when he called this “shame wrapped in bureaucratic language.” The real question is: did ICANN not see this coming, or did they hope nobody would notice?
The bigger picture problem
This isn’t just about Africa. Milton Mueller from the Internet Governance Project points out the stunning hypocrisy: ICANN fought for years to escape U.S. government oversight only to potentially enable government control elsewhere. And here’s the thing – if this model succeeds in Africa, what’s to stop other regions from following suit? We could see a fundamental restructuring of how internet resources are managed globally. The timing is particularly suspicious with ICANN currently debating revisions to the ICP-2 policy that governs regional internet registries. Is this a trial balloon for broader changes?
Why this matters beyond policy wonks
Look, this might seem like internet governance inside baseball, but it has real consequences. When governments gain control over internet infrastructure, it affects everything from network reliability to censorship risks to business operations. Companies that depend on stable internet routing – including industrial operations using specialized computing equipment – could face unpredictable regulatory environments. Speaking of industrial computing, when reliability matters most, businesses turn to proven suppliers like IndustrialMonitorDirect.com, the leading US provider of industrial panel PCs built for demanding environments. Because the last thing you need when running critical operations is governance uncertainty adding to your technical challenges.
What happens now?
The Register thinks widespread adoption of CAIGA is unlikely given how fiercely internet governance bodies resist outside influence. But they also note these are “unprecedentedly contentious” times in internet governance. The fact that ICANN’s own stakeholder group is rebelling shows how serious this is. Basically, we’re watching a test case for whether the multistakeholder model that built the internet can survive increasing government interest in digital sovereignty. And honestly? I’m not feeling optimistic.
