Summary

  • AFRINIC opened a second consultation on a proposed amended Constitution on 4 August; comments close on 21 August at 23:59 UTC, and the draft is not operative.
  • The current 2020 Constitution already contains a broad Board-controlled ground for terminating Resource Membership and already requires returned resources. Those provisions are not new.
  • New Article 8.6 would let the Board delegate Resource or Associate Member suspension and termination to the CEO or another officer, while excluding Registered Member termination from that route.
  • The draft also requires written delegation, retained Board accountability, a published process, an impartial timely appeal and a public decision register. Yet its explanatory note says an independent external legal opinion is still awaited on the Board’s authority to terminate membership.
  • AFRINIC’s current Registration Services Agreement says termination immediately revokes number resources and ends services without liability, while its general liability formula is the greater of six months of fees or US$100. Authority, a stay-capable independent appeal, continuity and funded remedy must therefore precede delegation.

The proposal delegates a power whose legal basis is still an open question

AFRINIC has asked its community to review a new route from constitutional power to executive action.

The draft’s Article 8.6 would allow the Board to give the chief executive or another designated company officer any Board power under the Constitution to suspend or terminate a Resource Member or Associate Member. Termination of a Registered Member is expressly excluded from delegation. Resource Members receive no equivalent protection.

The same draft’s Article-by-Article explanation then records an unresolved premise. An independent external legal opinion is “presently awaited” on the question of the Board’s authority to terminate membership, it says, and the rationale will be updated after that advice is received and considered.

The note does not say the Board possesses the power. It does not say the Board lacks it. No court conclusion can be manufactured from an opinion that has not arrived. But the order is consequential: the instrument designs a delegation mechanism before its own explanation has closed the authority question on which delegation depends.

That is the news in this consultation. AFRINIC did not invent all termination exposure in August 2026. Current Article 8.2 already permits the Board, acting reasonably and in good faith, to terminate Resource Membership for specified failures and for “such other event or such other grounds” as it determines from time to time. Current Article 8.5 already requires resources to be returned when membership ends.

The proposed text retains the catch-all and return requirement. Calling either one new would conceal the actual institutional change: Article 8.6 would add an executive channel for exercising suspension or termination powers.

Real safeguards do not answer who may act

Article 8.6 contains more process than a simple handover.

Delegation must be written. The Board can prescribe limits, conditions, procedures, reports and oversight, and it remains ultimately responsible and accountable for lawful, fair and proper use. A delegate must report decisions to the Board. AFRINIC must publish a transparent suspension and termination process, identify the grounds and decision-maker, provide an appeal described as fair, impartial and timely, and keep the process accessible to members.

AFRINIC would also have to publish a register after each decision as soon as reasonably practicable. Subject to law, court orders, confidentiality and personal-data rules, it would identify the member, effective date, governing instrument and concise grounds.

Those are material improvements. They create records against which members, courts and reporters could test what happened. An accurate account should not erase them merely because the authority problem is serious.

But disclosure after a decision is not protection before execution. The draft qualifies notice and the opportunity to respond with “where applicable” without defining when either may be withheld. It describes an impartial appeal but does not name an independent or external reviewer, an appointment method, a conflicts rule, an evidence-disclosure duty, a deadline, reversal powers or compensation.

Most importantly for a network operator, it does not say an appeal automatically pauses action. It does not require preservation of the last verified registration, RPKI, reverse-DNS, WHOIS or RDAP state while a contested decision is reviewed.

A Board-selected procedure can be transparent and still leave the same authority chain controlling the delegate, evidence, appeal and execution. Publication makes power visible. It does not by itself make that power lawful, independent or reparable.

Termination is an operational switch, not a meeting-rights sanction

The current Registration Services Agreement explains why the missing stay matters.

AFRINIC’s membership-agreement page says the RSA applies to Resource Members and identifies the English PDF as the legally binding version on that page. This packet cannot establish that every member signed the same historical version, so a member-specific dispute still requires the exact executed contract.

The published RSA nevertheless shows the consequence model. Its services include allocation, assignment, transfer, reverse-name delegation and maintenance and administration of number-resource records. Clause 11 provides notice, an invitation to show cause or cure, and 30 days for a response before AFRINIC termination. AFRINIC then decides whether the response is satisfactory.

On termination or expiry, clause 11(e) says AFRINIC will immediately revoke the number resources and cease services without incurring liability. Membership rights and benefits end immediately, and outstanding fees remain due. The contract’s appeal path ends with a final Board decision.

Clause 10 broadly excludes liability for interruption, error, defect and damage subject to its stated exception. It puts both parties’ liability at the greater of the amount paid to AFRINIC in the preceding six months or US$100.

That formula is not a damages judgment, and its application can depend on the contract and law. It is still the published contractual allocation of downside. An operator may face route, customer, financing and continuity consequences far beyond the remedy the registry says it will bear.

Written delegation therefore cannot be reviewed as administrative convenience alone. The complete chain is Board authority, delegated officer, grounds, evidence, notice, decision, appeal, stay, resource status, service continuity, restoration and compensation.

Sources

Further reading