Breakthrough for ICANN, Court Decision Permits Delegation of. AFRICA

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) announced that a California Superior Court has denied DotConnectAfrica’s (DCA’s) second Motion for preliminary injunction to stop the delegation of the. AFRICA generic top-level domain (gTLD) to ZA Central Registry (ZACR).

DCA’s first Motion for Preliminary Injunction was denied by the Superior Court in December 2016.

A statement jointly endorsed by Buket Coşkuner, global communications coordinator, and Luna Madi, communications director, EMEA, and made available, Friday, to Nigeria CommunicationsWeek showed among other things, the Judge found that it appears the "Covenant Not to Sue" found in the New gTLD Applicant Guidebook is enforceable, citing to the recent Federal District Court Order in the Ruby Glen, LLC v ICANN matter, wherein the Court held that the “covenant not to sue” in the Guidebook is enforceable.

Accordingly, the Superior Court Judge ruled that “DCA's claims against ICANN for fraud and unfair business practices are likely to be barred.  As a result, DCA cannot establish that it is likely to succeed on the merits.”

In accordance with the terms of its Registry Agreement with ZACR for .AFRICA, the statement read, ICANN will now follow its normal processes towards delegation.

Delegation of Generic TopLevel Domain (gTLD)
ICANN’s guide to the generic top-level domain (gTLD) redelegation process comes to effect when the IANA Root Zone Database must be updated to reflect a change in the management of a

gTLD. The primary requirement of this process is to have an existing contract with ICANN, which reflects the changes related to the management of the gTLD.

To update the Root Zone Database to reflect a change to the registry operator for a gTLD, the registry must first secure an executed amendment to its Registry Agreement in accordance with its contractual obligations with ICANN. Once completed, a root zone change request should be filed according to the routine change process defined below.

During processing of the change request, ICANN’s IANA department will confirm with ICANN’s new gTLD team that the request accurately reflects the currently contracted party for the given gTLD. (Note that this process differs from the redelegation process for a country-code top-level domain.) and a delegation report will be sent to the ICANN Board and the Root Zone Administrator.