CAIGA is not reform, it is a rewrite of who controls Africa’s internet

• CAIGA has exposed deep fractures within Africa’s internet community, as many question whether it represents reform or a political takeover.
• Critics argue Smart Africa and ICANN are accelerating governance instability by promoting a state-centric model during AFRINIC’s weakest moment.

A crisis creates space for competing agendas

Africa’s internet governance ecosystem is at a critical juncture. AFRINIC, the continent’s Regional Internet Registry, has suffered years of institutional failure—governance paralysis, contested elections, legal battles and a steady erosion of community trust. Into this vacuum has stepped the Continental Africa Internet Governance Architecture (CAIGA), an initiative closely associated with Smart Africa and developed with ICANN’s financial and institutional involvement.

This moment of collapse has polarised stakeholders. Some see CAIGA as an unavoidable intervention following AFRINIC’s breakdown. Others view it as an opportunistic power grab, exploiting institutional weakness to introduce a political governance layer that would permanently reshape Africa’s internet oversight.

The divide is not about whether AFRINIC has failed—few dispute that—but about what should replace it. See also: AfriNIC board faces legitimacy test.

Also Read: Will CAIGA Improve Cross-Border Internet Cooperation?

Community governance versus political authority

At the heart of the disagreement lies a fundamental clash of governance models. Africa’s internet has historically been managed through bottom-up, multistakeholder processes, where operators, engineers and civil society share authority. CAIGA proposes something markedly different: a centralised architecture in which governments play a dominant role, with political endorsement mechanisms sitting above community processes. See also: AfriNIC board: The Eight Who Govern Africa’s Internet.

Critics warn this shift marginalises the very communities that have kept Africa’s internet functioning despite AFRINIC’s failures. They argue CAIGA replaces accountability with hierarchy, and technical consensus with political alignment. Rather than repairing governance, CAIGA risks institutionalising the same opacity and capture that undermined AFRINIC—only on a continental scale See also: AfriNIC's Vanishing Member register.

Also Read: CAIGA’s arrival: A threat to Africa’s multistakeholder governance

ICANN’s involvement intensifies distrust

ICANN’s role has further deepened divisions. The organisation has funded and participated in the development of Smart Africa’s governance blueprint, despite publicly claiming neutrality. Milton Mueller at the Internet Governance Project argue this contradicts ICANN’s long-standing commitment to bottom-up governance and creates a dangerous double standard for Africa.

Stakeholders ask why a state-centric governance experiment is being enabled in Africa when similar models would be rejected elsewhere. Until those questions are answered, CAIGA will remain a source of division—less a solution to Africa’s governance crisis than a catalyst for deeper conflict over autonomy, accountability and control. See also: AFRINIC crisis: when receiver becomes legal risk.