Dear Dean,

Thank you for your comments.

I believe the problem here is that we appear to be trying to solve two problems with one proposal, and accomplishing neither.

Kusumba appears to be attempting to mitigate a situation where a government is a deciding factor in how an NIR is created. There appears to be a suggestion that said government may not represent the majority of either APNIC Members or even Internet users within a given country. With this in mind Kusumba has put forward a proposal to lessen the power that a government would have in the establishment of an NIR.

Kusumba S >>> It is a fact that APNIC members in an economy are independent of local Government. APNIC members need not be only those members who are ISPs or Network Providers. They could be Large corporates, Software companies, Manufacturing units, Universities, Medial companies, BPOs, Call Centres etc, who are not bound by majority of the policies of the Government. In a situation where a particular department or agency represented by Government wish to establish NIR, it is important that the members (APNIC members) in that economy agree to the same consider various local situations and policies.

In the current criteria, as long as the agency / company is able to get government endorsement, they comply to major requirement of forming NIR and if that agency / company is Government promoted, the endorsement is automatic and will never be in the knowledge of the APNIC members also within that economy.

There is however an opposing view. The view that there may be some countries where a non-government entity establishes and NIR. If this is done with no government involvement, then it also possible that it will lack and credibility, respect or legitimacy from the wider community within that country.

Kusumba S >>> I guess, as explained above, members are first members of APNIC then comes the question of NIR. If there are no members, there is no NIR. So, it is those members who need to decide what they want.

As you can see we have two situations which are not being addressed by either current policy or proposal 60 as it stands. This is not surprising as we live in a region with a large number of different government systems.

I believe what is needed here is not to exclude governments from the NIR establishment process, but the formation of a set of checks and balances to guard against the sort of abuse of power which Kusumba seems to be suggesting exists in some markets. This would also minimise the possibility that a non-government entity could form an NIR with no legitimacy from the local community and government.

Kusumba S >>> My policy proposal does not restrict any Government represented agency or Government itself to form NIR at the first place. Irrespective of who proposes to form NIR, the members (APNIC members) within that economy must agree to the same since they are the one who may obtain services from such NIR once established. So, the same can be achieved by an Online Voting process as "for" and "against".

If there was no agreement between the local community and the government then the status quo (administration by APNIC) would remain. In essence the process remains failsafe.

Kusumba S >>> The current policy has no provision to take consensus or view of the members in that economy. So, any Government agency that gets endorsement can also form NIR.

All that remains to be done is to develop these checks and balances. I feel that moving forward along those lines will bring everyone to consensus rather than looking to exclude government involvement.

Kusumba S >>> Ver 1.0 of the Proposal carried some of those checks and balances.

Greetings,

Kusumba S

Regards Dean Pemberton