Highlight of the Day: Opening Ceremony
The AIS'16 Opening Ceremony took place on Monday 6 June at 17:00. Formally opened by HEM Minister of Transport and Communication HEM Tshenolo Mabeo, the session also saw speeches by the representatives of the AF*: Pierre Dandjinou (ICANN), Boubakar Barry (AfREN), Dr Nii Quaynor (AfNOG), Marcus Adomey (AfricaCERT), Ali Hadj (AfTLD), Raul Echeberria (ISOC), Alan Barrett (AFRINIC), and Thari G. Pheko (BOCRA).
The Opening Ceremony was followed by a Welcome Cocktail.
AIS'16 Newcomers Session
First time meeting goers were given a comprehensive introduction to the AIS'16, the AFRINIC meetings and the AFRINIC community. Discussions centred on the various organisations and stakeholders that make up the African - and global - Internet industry, what AFRINIC is and does, the AFRINIC community and the Policy Development process.
Workshops
More workshops were held today including:
- AFRINIC's Internet Number Resource Management (INRM) Training Course
- AfNOG Tutorials - Smartphone Application Development - Android and Google Apps in Education.
The workshop sessions were attended by over 150 people.
Women in ICT Forum
The AIS'16 female industry leaders gathered for the Women in ICT Forum to share knowledge, best practice and success stories.
During the morning sessions, the Internet Society hosted Connected Women: a particularly lively event where four of Africa’s digital trailblazers - Evelyn Namara, Dorcas Muthoni, Agang Ditlohogo, and Michuki Mwangi - shared their experiences with developing capacity in ICT and discussed how the community can work together to overcome cultural barriers to promote greater involvement of women developing and using Internet technology across Africa.
For Evelyn, “access [to the Internet] alone is not enough [to make change]...you have to do a lot of capacity building and understand the needs of the people you are connecting”.
Quotes like this from each speaker where applauded by the 80+ engaged audience, many of who took the opportunity during the panel discussion to share their own experiences and direct questions to the speakers.
Watch the live video stream here.
Parallel Meetings
The AfREN/AA meeting and the AfGWG meeting both took place on 6 June.
The AfREN Meeting provided updates from three regional RENs : ASREN, Ubuntunet Alliance and WACREN. These activities updates also included the EC funded Africaconnect2 project. The session concluded with a brainstorming on the sustainability of AfREN. The session was attended by 39 participants.
The AFRINIC Government Working Group (AfGWG) gathered Government representatives and regulators from the African continent.
Participants included:
- Nishal Goburdhan from Packet Clearing House
- Michuki Mwangi, the Senior Development Manager of Africa at Internet Society
- Allan Barrett, the CEO of AFRINIC
- Pierre Dandjinou, ICANN VP for Stakeholder engagement