[rpd] Appeal Committee Terms of Reference (Version 1)

Thu Aug 3 05:08:06 UTC 2017

So firstly,

This is a public mailing list – if questions are posed on it in a public forum – people are free to respond – just as you are free not to answer those questions or read them or take any heed to them.  Otherwise, I’m sure you are free to email the questions to the person asking off list.

For the record – without answering for Sunday or the board – I *FULLY* support the need for members of the appeal committee to be from off continent – and the rationale is simple.

Anyone ON continent is likely to be influenced by the policies themselves – unless you choose people entirely outside of the industry that is – and such people will not have knowledge of the policy process or the policy content.  That creates conflict of interest.  I point out that this community clearly voted to say that conflict of interest must be dealt with in terms of the board – why should this be any different?  As for the board itself handling the appeal – this is a direct conflict as well, since the board has to ratify the proposal – and by asking them to handle the appeal as well, they are handling an appeal on a policy that they then have to ratify.  This simply cannot happen.

Policy appeals must be neutral in nature – totally divorced from impact by the policy, and indeed the proposed TOR’s state that any conflicted individual shall be recused from considering the said proposal.  So, let us look for example at the review policy (just as an example).  Anyone who either works for an organisation who holds resources from AFRINIC or who directly holds resources from AFRINIC would automatically be conflicted in this process – and you may well find you end up having to recuse the entire appeal committee, since anyone holding resources from AFRINIC under that policy is subject to review.

Appeals committees that are divorced from the issue are just good corporate governance, and this follows global standards for appeals.

I’d also say that considering the very obvious deep divides on this continent, where at the microphone in 3 successive meetings, different individuals have raised the divides in this community that seem to be based on geopolitical, linguistic and other divides, rather than policy content, it is even more critical that we find external individuals to arbitrate when it comes to these appeals – because it removes the chance of people screaming that the appeals committee is biased based on the aforementioned factors.  I fail to see the harm in avoiding the risk of bias.

Andrew

From: Omo Oaiya [mailto:Omo.Oaiya at wacren.net]
Sent: 03 August 2017 02:42
To: Owen DeLong <owen at delong.com>
Cc: Sunday Folayan <sfolayan at gmail.com>; rpd List <rpd at afrinic.net>
Subject: Re: [rpd] Appeal Committee Terms of Reference (Version 1)

Owen,

If you were subtle enough to read between the lines, you would notice that folks are saying that these questions are directed at the Afrinic board NOT you.

Please let the Board Chair answer or do you speak for him now as well as the Co-Chairs and Internet community at large?   Time you showed some decorum and were a bit more circumspect with your perpetual intrusion.

-Omo

On 2 Aug 2017, at 14:19, Owen DeLong <owen at delong.com<mailto:owen at delong.com>> wrote:

On Aug 2, 2017, at 07:53 , Noah <noah at neo.co.tz<mailto:noah at neo.co.tz>> wrote:

Dear Afrinic Board Chair,

I almost missed this and I have quickly gone through it and I want to thank you for your effort ref: this Appeal Committee Terms of Reference, however, I have some questions section 2.?

Seats 1 and 2: Two of the past chairs or past co-chairs of the AFRINIC policy development working group (PDWG).

+1 and in support of the selection of seat 1 and 2 as those make sense.

For Seats 3 and 4:   I wonder if other RIR's have provisions that require members from the AFRINIC region to seat in their appeal committees?

Other RIRs have very different circumstances. As is often pointed out even when the circumstances in the AfriNIC region are not so different. However, in this case, they are quite different. No other RIR has such a degree of infighting nor such a large degree of mistrust among the factions around their policy proposals. Indeed, in the other regions, the factions on any given policy proposal are often quite different and you don’t find nearly identical groups clumping together in support or opposition of a proposal as you do in the AfriNIC region. Indeed, to the best of my knowledge, no other RIR has even such a review committee in the first place.

I don’t know the appeal process (if one exists) in RIPE, LACNIC, or APNIC, but in the ARIN region, the process is governed by what we call the petition process. If members of the community dislike a decision of the ARIN Advisory Council, they can petition that action on the mailing list. If enough other independent participants express support for the petition,

Details are here: https://www.arin.net/policy/pdp_petitions.html<https://www.arin.net/policy/pdp_petitions.html>

I fail to understand the rational around selecting 2 members from 2 different RIR's as if the AFRINIC community lacks people within our region who can fill up seats 3 and 4.

I believe the intent is to create a greater degree of independence from the internal politics inherent in the AfriNIC region and to increase the transparency and fairness of the process. I think this is a legitimate approach in this case because, frankly, I think that members from different RIRs are more likely to examine the issue purely on the record and the merits of the arguments without regard for the factionalism and politics involved. These are issues that simply either don’t exist or are a much much smaller problem in the other RIRs.

For Seat 5: A current or past chair or vice chair of the NRO NC/ASO AC, who is not from the AFRINIC region.

What is the rational behind this?  I mean the Afrinic board cant find, out of a continent with 1.2 billion people, one person from within the AFRINIC numbering or names community who can take up seat 5?.

Again, I believe that the intent here is similar to the intent with seats 3 and 4. I consider this an entirely reasonable approach to maintaining the independence of the appeals committee and applaud the board’s wisdom and foresight in this matter.

Owen

Cheers,
Noah

On 19 Jul 2017 3:54 p.m., "Sunday Folayan" <sfolayan at gmail.com<mailto:sfolayan at gmail.com>> wrote:
Dear PDWG,

The AFRINIC Board of Directors intends to establish an Appeal Committee to give effect to the requirements in section 3.5 of the Consolidated Policy Manual (that is, the Conflict resolution portion of the Policy Development Process).

The Appeal Committee Terms of Reference (version 1) is published at https://afrinic.net/en/community/working-groups/policy-appeal<https://afrinic.net/en/community/working-groups/policy-appeal>

The Board calls for comments on the Terms of Reference for a 30 day period, ending on 19 August 2017. Comments may be sent to the RPD mailing list <rpd at afrinic.net<mailto:rpd at afrinic.net>>.

The Board intends to appoint an interim Appeal Committee without delay, to cater for the possibility that an appeal might be filed before the comments on the Terms of reference can be taken into account. We seek the cooperation of the community in this regard.

Sunday Folayan
Chair of the AFRINIC Board of Directors

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—
Omo Oaiya
CTO/Directeur Technique, WACREN
Mobile: +234 806 4522778, +221 784 305 224
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