The story of AFRINIC: How Africa’s internet ideal was destroyed from within

• AFRINIC was meant to put Africa on the global internet stage, a mechanism for it to manage its internet numbers system independently, without foreign assistance
• But corruption destroyed the political and managerial systems, and when it tried to get back on track with the 2025 elections just last week, its managers again turned their backs on reform

AFRINIC won’t be a word many people, even in the various internet communities around the world, will recognise. But for those that have been following this tale of managerial incompetence and political warfare, that word will elicit groans of exasperation. See also: Alejandro Fernandez.

AFRINIC is one of the five Regional Internet Registries around the world that administrate the allocation of IP addresses – the essential components of internet-connected devices that allow those devices to receive data correctly, be it text messages, internet-enabled phone calls, web pages or videos. See also: Aldo Garcia.

Last week, June 23, it held an election for a new board of directors. Why? It has been operating without a board and CEO since 2022, when its then executives were disbanded after allegations of corruption and mismanagement. There followed three years of limbo in which the staff at the registry gamely worked on, to ensure African internet businesses could continue, but without a board or CEO innovation ceased and the company that was meant to be Africa’s internet showpiece had to sprint just to stand still. See also: Alcymer Vieira.

Also read: AFRINIC staff violated obligations during 2025 election

AFRINIC elections – a poisoned pill?

The elections last week were meant to bring AFRINIC back from the brink – this was the organisation’s chance to not only deliver a stellar management team with the expertise and the will to take Africa’s internet into the future, but also to show the world that it could be done, in-house. Africa’s online businesses could flourish with an African organisation leading the way. See also: Alcides Cremonezi.

But, once again, people will be left scratching their heads after a series of actions from staff in the Electoral Committee and Nominating Committee saw the Official Receiver step in to first suspend the election, and then annul it completely. See also: Alberto Anaya.

This, because a single vote, delivered by proxy, could not be fully verified. And so AFRINIC, already the scapegoat of the internet numbers ecosystem, once again has imploded, destroying its own processes from within, like a snake eating its own tail. See also: Albert Kis.

Many will say they saw this coming. To understand why, we have to travel back a few years to note the moments where this institution that started with such aspiration and expectation, started to corrode.

Also read: As ICANN threatens to ‘review’ AFRINIC, an elected board is its only hope for survival

AFRINIC as Africa’s internet beacon

AFRINIC was born out of vision. In the late 1990s, African technologists, frustrated by their dependence on foreign institutions to allocate digital resources, gathered in Benin and laid the groundwork for an entity that would empower African internet development from within. By 2005, AFRINIC was officially operational. Headquartered in Mauritius, it distributed IP addresses for the African continent beside its global counterparts – ARIN, RIPE NCC, APNIC, and LACNIC – as one of the five Regional Internet Registries.

Its early leaders, including Adiel Akplogan, Nii Quaynor, Pierre Ouédraogo, and Alain Aina, were respected and built trust within the community, helping position AFRINIC as a beacon of pan-African technical capacity. Through the 2000s, the organization grew in legitimacy and reach, servicing thousands of companies that depended on its stability to build their businesses, and add to Africa’s emerging digital economy.

Also read: AFRINIC election suspended, hundreds unable to vote

AFRINIC vulnerabilities

But beneath the surface, AFRINIC had vulnerabilities that would later prove fatal. It was registered under Mauritian civil law as a private entity, not an intergovernmental body, nor backed by any African political bloc. It lacked legal immunity or protection through international treaties. In practice, this meant it was at the mercy of local courts and local politics, with no external buffer in the face of disputes.

That fragility was exposed in 2019. Investigations revealed that millions of IP addresses had been allocated in secret and diverted to foreign shell companies. One internal actor, Policy Coordinator Ernest Byaruhanga, was implicated in manipulating records and overseeing transfers worth tens of millions of dollars. The fallout was immediate and explosive.

AFRINIC, belatedly trying to clean house, revoked much of this contested IP space and triggered a legal counter-attack, especially in the case of Cloud Innovation, which claimed the attempted confiscation was illegal and its own activities were entirely just and within the terms described. Over 50 lawsuits were filed against it in Mauritian courts. The effect these lawsuits had was crippling – AFRINIC’s bank accounts were frozen, board meetings were blocked, and elections halted. The registry became a hostage to its own legal structure.

Also read: AFRINIC elections 2025: Everything you need to know

Number Resource Limited and Number Resource Society

In the ensuing chaos, staff had to operate without oversight. The board dissolved. The CEO stepped down. For nearly three years, the organization continued on autopilot, issuing resources while its governance mechanisms crumbled.

The 2025 elections were supposed to end that limbo. After months of careful preparation, community engagement, and court-mandated deadlines, a vote was held on June 23. Hundreds of members turned up, many via proxies legally assigned and organized through Number Resource Limited, associated with a vocal campaigning group called the Number Resource Society. This group had long advocated for fairness, transparency and equality, espousing a new AFRINIC that would abolish membership fees and provide true ownership of IP addresses, something that no other internet registry was offering.

It was AFRINIC’s first real opportunity to prove that it could still deliver democratic legitimacy, in a way that could act as an example for the world. Instead, the process collapsed yet again, this time over a single allegedly unverified proxy vote.

Also read: AFRINIC election: 2nd attempt to delay voting fails

AFRINIC’s questionable decisions

Again, questions will be asked of the decision-making that took place. Rather than discard the suspicious vote and proceed, staff suspended the entire election. Days later, under unclear influence from both the Official Receiver and the Ministry of ICT, the results were annulled. Hundreds of legitimate ballots were discarded. Proxies that had been legally registered and notarized were ignored. AFRINIC, where poor decisions nearly led to its collapse just a few years earlier, chose once again to destroy its own path forward, like a firewall turning against its own server.

Additionally, stories emerged of Election Committee members removing Power of Attorney documents from the ballot room, to call the resource members named on the document. This would be a violation of several of AFRINIC’s own election terms, stipulating confidentiality and non-disclosure.

Then there are the decisions made by the Official Receiver Dabee, and a British lawyer, Simon Davenport KC, who headed the Nominating Committee. It was they who took the decisions to suspend voting, after the suspicious proxy vote was identified, and then annul the entire election.

Again, one needs to ask if a single vote was cause for suspicion, why not eradicate that single vote? Why go to the extreme length of annulling an entire election? Especially an election that is so critical to the African internet ecosystem, one that could get the registry on a track headed for growth and success, rather than one bogged down in legal red tape and mud-slinging.

The birth of AFRINIC was a triumph of African collaboration. Its growth was a testament to what the continent could achieve when given tools and trust. But it is becoming a cautionary tale of what happens when institutions lack the political spine, legal safeguards, and moral leadership to protect themselves.

Also read: AFRINIC elections 2025: ICANN is ‘inappropriate’, ‘unreasonable’ and ‘irresponsible’

AFRINIC attracts irrelevant organisations

Such is the drama that AFRINIC has attracted, organisations that have no real relationship to the events have found themselves drawn in.

ICANN, the body that looks after all the world’s domain names, DNS records and other technical identifiers of the internet, waded into the pit putting AFRINIC on notice that it was at risk of being audited for compliance. Referring to a document that was only ratified a few months prior to the election, ICANN president and CEO Kurt Lindqvist wrote: “Due to the shocking allegations and complaints of conduct surrounding the AFRINIC Board of Directors election, with this letter ICANN is formally putting AFRINIC on notice that a compliance review may well be necessary.”

The Supreme Court of Mauritius, in an earlier response to an ICANN application, said “the applicant has no locus standi to enter such an application before this Court,” meaning ICANN was an irrelevant stakeholder in AFRINIC’s activities – but this appeared to be ignored. The court also said ICANN was “inappropriate’, ‘unreasonable’ and ‘irresponsible’ in its application, that threatened to derail the much-needed election.

The Mautirian government, in the form of the Ministry of Information and Communication Technologies, has also stepped in to stop any results from being published. This, for an election within a private company, that was mandated by the Supreme Court.

Also read: 8 men hoping to lead AFRINIC into the future

AFRINIC’s future

So what’s next?

Officially, the annulment of the just-gone election means a new election must be set. Gowtamsingh Dabee, the court-appointed Official Receiver, wrote on the AFRINIC website on June 26: “I am petitioning the Supreme Court of Mauritius for a limited extension of the current mandate solely to allow for the proper organization and execution of new, fully verified elections taking on board all stakeholders within a reasonable timeframe.”

But one has to ask if simply allowing the current election results to stand wouldn’t be a better resolution, even if only temporarily. There are many who think AFRINIC is in such need of direction from within, rather than being pulled this way and that from outside, it should be given a board that can do so.

A single dubious proxy vote should not annul every vote, goes the thinking. “Suspicion is not a crime” said one source close to the events.