INTERNET GOVERNANCE: WHO COORDINATES? BY REBECCA WANJIKU - Highway Africa News Agency- Geneva A major rift, between developed countries and African governments, over who controls the Internet could herald a new era in the information society. African delegates attending the WSIS third preparatory committee have sought to dilute the role of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) through the establishment of an intergovernmental body within the UN framework. ICANN is the organisation that currently coordiantes and manages top level domain names. African delegates argue that the proposed UN body set to replace ICANN will have the interests of all governments and Internet users at heart while the California based non profit body says that is not feasible because the American government and other interested parties have made substantial investments to make it what it is today. The chairman of the Internet governance sub committee, Francis Wangusi, says that ICANN should not be allowed to control Internet matters alone because it is controlled by the Commerce Department of the United States. He argues that Internet governance should be controlled by an intergovernmental body rather than a single country - in this case the USA. Ann Rachel Inne, a policy analyst at ICANN describes this argument as 'misdirected' because ICANN is a non profit organization with corporate status. In this regard, she claimed that ICANN is independent from the US department of commerce. The rift stems from a provision in the draft Declaration of Principles at the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) which states that countries have the liberty to elect the coordinator of international Internet issues. In terms of the Draft Declaration (still in square brackets) delegates have been invited to choose whether Internet affairs should be coordinated by governments and other interested parties, intergovernmental, organizations under the UN framework, or international organizations. African countries such as South Africa, Kenya and Namibia have openly supported the establishment of an intergovernmental body within the UN framework. This proposition has received intense criticism from capitalists who feel that governments may not provide the necessary infrastructure. The argument by African delegates is that they need protection from their respective governments especially in the area of domain ownership and control. They do not want to be answerable to USA over the creation and ownership of certain domain names. ?ICANN wants to entrench itself as an international organization while its operations are under the US department of commerce. The rights of member states should not be dictated by one country,? said Wangusi. Inne said however, that ICANN does not deal with public policy issues but with technical issues. She stressed that ICANN has entered into various forms of agreements with different governments for the maintenance of Internet registries, registers and root servers. Inne is confident that ICANN will receive overwhelming support from developed nations such as Canada, European Union countries, Australia and Japan because ?they understand what ICANN is all about and the implications of the suggestions.? Steve Katjiuanjo from the Namibian government also shares the opinion that the final declaration should provide for an intergovernmental body. He contends that a regulatory body has to be established for the arbitration of Internet related disputes. "If we allow private entities under certain governments to regulate our domains, we will have a similar case of Microsoft where it is stifling development over the sale of its software,? said Katjiuanjo. The draft declaration is curently still between square brackets because not all countries have agreed on the specific wording. If the proposal by African governments is added to the final declaration, then ICANN will have to search for other roles to play in the ICT field. However, Inne does not foresee such a situation because: ?eighty two governments are represented in ICANN and WSIS is only a vision.? According to her, African governments should strengthen their role in ICANN and use it to benefit their countries other that asking for immediate prerogatives through the declaration.