Summary

  • The express power to revoke African number resources sits in AFRINIC's Registration Service Agreement, a contract stated to be governed by the laws of Mauritius, not in AFRINIC's recognition as the region's registry.
  • Mauritian courts have decided corporate authority, standing, receivership and the conduct of board elections. They have not decided the merits of terminating a Registration Service Agreement or reclaiming the resources at issue.
  • Since 2025 the registry has been run under contested dual control: a Board of Directors that assumed office on 15 September 2025 and a court-appointed Receiver whose discharge application was heard with judgment awaited.

The instrument that grants the power

AFRINIC's Registration Service Agreement (RSA) is the agreement that governs registration services provided to its Resource Members, and the standard version AFRINIC publishes is expressed to be governed by the laws of the Republic of Mauritius (registration service agreement page, standard RSA PDF, 2018-01).

The revocation power in that document is contractual rather than regulatory. The RSA states that AFRINIC may revoke number resources assigned to the other party and terminate the agreement in furtherance of action taken after insolvency, bankruptcy, receivership or cessation-of-business events, and that where the agreement is terminated or expires, AFRINIC "will immediately revoke the number resources and otherwise cease providing the services without incurring any liability whatsoever" (standard RSA PDF). The same agreement gives an organisation or member that considers the assigning registry has not performed its task properly a right of appeal to AFRINIC's Board, with the Board's decision stated to be final.

Two boundaries matter for anyone relying on that text. First, the version inspected is the standard 2018-01 document; individual signed RSAs may differ, and the clause numbering above describes the published standard form. Second, a contractual right of appeal whose final arbiter is the Board is only as effective as the Board's own standing to decide — which is exactly what is being litigated.

The constitution allocates membership and the board

The Bylaws define a Resource Member by cumulative formalities: a legal entity that has justified its need for the right to use Internet Number Resources, signed AFRINIC's Registration Service Agreement, and paid the relevant setup and membership fees (Bylaws). The same instrument entitles members by majority vote at the Annual General Members' Meeting to elect Directors under Article 13.5, and sets a nine-seat Board — six Directors elected by sub-region, two region-independent Directors, and the Chief Executive Officer as the ninth seat (Bylaws).

That structure explains why the current dispute reaches beyond one member's contract. Whoever can define "member in good standing" can shape who votes, and whoever can elect a board can shape who, in practice, hears an appeal. The consolidated Bylaws page may not reflect every amendment, including the dispute-resolution text in Article 24, so the published page is evidence of the operative provisions rather than a certified amended text.

What the courts have decided, and what they have not

In an interlocutory judgment of 19 July 2022 the Supreme Court of Mauritius set aside AFRINIC's preliminary objection based on abuse of process and vexatious litigation, allowing Cloud Innovation's application to proceed, and recorded that the earlier Court of Civil Appeal decision had "expressly held" that the judges did "not propose to deal with the merits of the remaining grounds of appeal" (interlocutory judgment, 2022). That is a procedural holding. As of July 2022 there had been no final pronouncement on the termination of the RSA or the reclamation of the resources.

The October 2024 appellate ruling followed the same pattern. On 15 October 2024 the Court of Civil Appeal upheld the respondent's preliminary objections that the representative relied on lacked the necessary power or authority to cause the appeal to be lodged and to bind AFRINIC, and that two other named representatives had no locus standi, concluding that there was no valid appeal before the court. It restored the Commercial Division order of 12 September 2023, including the appointment of the Official Receiver and the direction to carry out board elections under AFRINIC's constitution, and substituted a two-month deadline for completing the election process (Court of Civil Appeal judgment, 2024).

The ruling therefore turned on corporate authority and standing, not on the substance of the RSA or the revocation question. Secondary reporting described the same outcome as the appeal being "dismissed", while the judgment's own reasoning is that there was no valid appeal at all because the appellant's representative could not bind the company. For a resource holder, that distinction is not cosmetic: it means the merits remain open rather than having been decided against either side.

Who controls decisions now

Operational control moved to the courts in stages. ICANN stated on 9 March 2025 that a Court Order of the Bankruptcy Division of the Supreme Court of Mauritius dated 12 February 2025 named Mr Gowtamsingh Dabee the newly appointed Receiver over AFRINIC, ordered him to expedite the design and conduct of elections to reconstitute the Board by 25 April 2025, and acknowledged the Receiver's powers under Mauritian law; ICANN described its own role as closely monitoring the situation and offering support and advice, recognising the Receiver as the officially appointed authority designated by the Mauritius courts (ICANN statement).

Elections followed. On 12 September 2025 AFRINIC announced results for eight Board seats, including Abdelaziz Hilali for Seat 1 (Northern Africa) and Ajao Adewole David for Seat 8 (Non-Regional), in a process overseen under the Receiver's mandate to constitute a new Board (election results). AFRINIC's annual report for the 2025 financial year states that between June 2022 and September 2025 there was no Board and no CEO, that the Board assumed office on 15 September 2025, that the Receiver was appointed by the Supreme Court of Mauritius on 12 February 2025, and that an Interim Management Committee of three senior Heads of Department was established with the Receiver's consent and remained in office until a substantive CEO is appointed (2025 annual report).

The handover is not complete, and both sides describe it as ongoing. A joint communiqué of the Board and the Receiver recorded that on 8 October 2025 the Receiver filed his "Application for Termination of Receivership" before the Supreme Court (Bankruptcy Division), that a decision of the court was awaited, that "a Board of Directors is now in place", and that until formal discharge Mr Dabee had agreed to continue supporting AFRINIC after the appointment of Directors (joint communiqué). On 5 November 2025 AFRINIC published notice that an application had been made to the Bankruptcy Division for termination of the receivership and the release or discharge of the Receiver, bearing Cause Number SC/COM/MOT/000757/2025 and fixed for hearing on 26 November 2025, with a Court Order of 29 October 2025 requiring members wishing to intervene to seek leave by 12 November 2025 (notice of application). The notice records a filed application and a hearing date, not a completed termination.

AFRINIC's own member update then described the resulting arrangement: the Board resumed duty in line with the Companies Act of Mauritius; the Receiver's application for discharge had been heard and judgment was awaited; legal filings were submitted seeking to invalidate the September 2025 elected directors; Cloud Innovation Ltd objected to the Receiver's discharge and sought the appointment of another receiver; and the Receiver continued to approve IP address allocations and assignments pending discharge (member update). Litigation has continued since: an AFRINIC communiqué dated 15 May 2026 states that on 14 May 2026 the Supreme Court issued an Interim Order against Cloud Innovation Ltd following publication, through its subsidiary Larus Ltd, of what AFRINIC called false and misleading statements about the leasing of AFRINIC number resources, and that the same court allowed ICANN to intervene as a party in the proceedings (communiqué, May 2026). AFRINIC's characterisation of those statements is AFRINIC's own; the interim order is not a merits ruling on any resource decision.

The limits of the recognition chain

AFRINIC's standing as the registry for the African region rests on a separate layer: the 2005 IANA recognition process, which reported on AFRINIC's establishment and its recognition as the regional internet registry for the African region, followed by transfer-of-authority arrangements with the other regional registries (IANA 2005 report). That chain designates a registry. Nothing in it is presented as a forum that decides whether one member's resources should be revoked, and ICANN has been explicit that it monitors and supports rather than adjudicating the revocation question (ICANN statement).

Where a remedy actually runs

For an affected holder, three routes exist and they are not equal. Contractually, the RSA provides an appeal to AFRINIC's Board whose decision is final — effective in practice only to the extent the deciding board's authority holds (RSA). Judicially, the Mauritian courts hold authority over the company, its receivership and its board composition, and have shown they will decide standing and authority even while leaving substance untouched (2024 judgment). Governance-wise, members can vote at the Annual General Members' Meeting, subject to the cumulative membership conditions and to any pending challenge to election outcomes (Bylaws).

The unsettled part is sequencing, not principle. Until a discharge order and any merits ruling exist, the practical answer to "who can take my addresses away, and who can give them back" is that the contract says one thing, a court-appointed Receiver has been acting on another, and a reconstituted Board is asserting a third. The registry's public record of itself is maintained on its AFRINIC directory entry).