“.Africa” New gTLD Signing Ceremony Held at ICANN 49 in Singapore

At ICANN 49 in Singapore today Akram Atallah, president of ICANN‘s Global Domains Division (GDD) and Lucky Masilela, CEO of ZA Central Registry (ZACR) participated in a symbolic signing ceremony that allows the new gTLD “.Africa” to proceed to delegation.

This marks the first Registry Agreement signed between ICANN and an African gTLD registry operator.

The Registry Agreement was signed at the Raffles City Convention Centre in Singapore, by ICANN representative, Akram Atallah (President, Global Domains Division), and ZA Central Registry (ZACR) representatives, Lucky Masilela (CEO) and Neil Dundas (COO).

A contingency representing the African Union Commission, dotAfrica, and ZADNA (domain name authority of South Africa) were in attendance, as well as several ZACR and ICANN staff members.

Mr Masilela said that “The finalisation and acceptance of contracting terms from ICANN means nothing can stop the dotAfrica show. In May 2014, the curtains will rise and the first of the dotAfrica domains will become available for application during the initial sunrise and land rush phases. The former will seek to ensure that domain names are made available to applicants who have corresponding trade mark rights, while the latter will see generic premium domain names being made available to the public”.