Stakeholders’ group agrees on membership process

Non-Commercial Stakeholders Group (NCSG) at the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has agreed to harmonise membership applications of all its sub-groups to avoid hiccups future.

The newly elected NCSG chairman, Mr. Robin Gross who disclosed this at the end of the 41 public meeting of ICANN at Dakar, the Senegalese capital, said that several discussions were held among the Non-Commercial User’ Constituency  (NCUC) and Non-Commercial Operational Concerns (NPOC) to resolve the issue centred on membership applications.

He confirmed that the leaderships of NCUC and NPOC were led at the meeting by Dr. Konstantinos Komaitis, and Amber Sterling respectively, held with ICANN’s Ombudsman acting as a neutral mediator.

Gross also said that the outcome of the meeting was that they were able to clarify several misunderstandings and recalibrate expectations regarding the NCSG membership application process so the Stakeholders Group (SG) should be less likely to have these setbacks in the future.

He pointed out that specifically, it was clarified that when new NCSG membership applications are submitted, they need to be submitted by the organization making the application itself, and not the chair of NCUC or NPOC.  

It was also agreed, according to him, for member stakeholders to come up with a membership form that could be submitted to the NCSG-EC and the constituency at the same time.

“Applications will be responded to by the Executive Council (EC) within two weeks from submission,” he assured.

Gross further said that the NCSG-EC would follow-up by conducting its own due diligence and verify the applicants as well as make its decision as agreed in the NCSG charter.“So with respect to the recent election results and the handling of membership applications, it was a very productive conversation and I am hopeful that we now have a clearer understanding of how to move forward,” he said.

He emphasized that in the actual sense, the NCSG Charter, which was agreed upon by the NCSG membership comprising NCUC, NPOC and the ICANN Board proscribes many of the mechanisms and processes that should be followed for administration of the SG.“It is my hope and sincere wish that past differences can be put aside and we can all begin working together in a cooperative and constructive fashion to build a stronger SG that promotes the interests of all noncommercial users of the Domains Name System (DNS),” he said.

NCSG, Gross said, welcomes its new members including the NPOC members and is looking forward to working with the participants in the coming months to build a stronger and more diverse Stakeholder Group at ICANN.

Remmy Nweke

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