The term of Chris Disspain, the ccNSO nominated Director fulfilling ICANN Board Seat 11, will expire at the ICANN69 Annual General Meeting 2020 in Hamburg. By November 2020, Chris will have served 3 terms on the Board: therefore, he is not eligible for reappointment. To meet the ICANN Bylaws requirement of appointing a Director by 22 April 2020, the ccNSO Council will open a call for nominations to fill ICANN Board Seat number 11, starting Wednesday, 11 September 2019 (00:01 UTC) and closing Wednesday, 2 October 2019 (23:59 UTC).
Below you will find all details related to the procedure for nominating and seconding candidates, and the next steps.
How to nominate and second a candidate
Timeline of the nomination and secondment procedure:
START: Wednesday, 11 September 2019 (00:01 UTC)
END: Wednesday, 2 October 2019 (23:59 UTC)
- Each ccNSO member can nominate one (1) person for a seat to be filled on the ICANN Board
- Each ccNSO member can second one (1) person for a seat to be filled on the ICANN Board
- Only ccTLD Managers who are a member of the ccNSO as of the publication date of the call for nominations, i.e. on 10 September 2019, can nominate or second a candidate
- All nominations must be seconded by another ccNSO member
- Nominations and secondments should be sent by e-mail to the Nomination Manager at the following e-mail address: ccnso-boardnominations@icann.org
Templates for nominating and seconding nominations are provided below
You are kindly invited to follow these instructions closely. Please do not use alternative templates.
Template for nominations:
NOMINATION TO THE ICANN BOARD
- Your full name:
- Your e-mail address:
- Your ccTLD:
- Full name of the person you nominate to the ICANN Board:
- E-mail address of the person you nominate:
- Country of citizenship or domicile of the person you nominate:
Template for seconding nominations:
SECONDING A NOMINATION TO THE ICANN BOARD
- Your full name:
- Your e-mail address:
- Your ccTLD:
- Full name of the nominee you would like to second:
- E-mail address of the nominee you would like to second:
Consult here the archive for nominations and secondments.
Requirements for suitably qualified candidates
- Citizenship or domicile
Bylaw Article 7 – Section 7.2 (c) states:
"(c) In carrying out their responsibilities to nominate Directors for Seats 9 through 15 for designation by the EC, the Supporting Organizations and the At-Large Community shall seek to ensure that the Board is composed of Directors who, in the aggregate, display diversity in geography, culture, skills, experience, and perspective, by applying the criteria set forth in Section 7.3, Section 7.4 and Section 7.5. The Supporting Organizations shall ensure that, at any given time, no two Directors nominated by a Supporting Organization are citizens from the same country or of countries located in the same Geographic Region. For purposes of this Section 7.2(c), if any candidate for Director maintains citizenship or Domicile of more than one country, that candidate may be deemed to be from either country and must select in his or her Statement of Interest the country of citizenship or Domicile that he or she wants the Supporting Organization or the At-Large Community, as applicable, to use for nomination purposes. For purposes of this Section 7.2(c), a person can only have one Domicile, which shall be determined by where the candidate has a permanent residence and place of habitation."
Nigel Roberts, Board Seat 12, has his domicile in Guernsey, Europe.
- Employment by a ccTLD
As per 3.4 of the Guideline: ccNSO Nominations process ICANN Board seats 11 and 12:
"Candidates are not required to be employed by a ccTLD in order to be able to be nominated, but if there is an employment or other relationship, that should be disclosed by the candidate as part of their Candidate Statement."
Accepting nominations and due diligence verifications
After closure of the nomination period, the Nomination Manager will ascertain whether the nominee(s) formally accept their nomination(s). The candidates have until Thu, 10 October 2019 (23:59 UTC) to accept their nominations. On Friday, 11 October 2019 (latest by 23:59 UTC), the Nomination Manager shall provide a list with the name(s) of the candidate(s) who have accepted their nomination. A record of who has nominated and seconded the candidate(s) is publicly available.
By acceptance of the nomination, a nominee warrants, is aware of, and consents to:
- The Country of Citizenship or Domicile included in the nomination form;
- Not to hold a position as an official of a national government or a multinational entity (section 7.4 (a) of the ICANN Bylaws;
- Section 7.4 (b) of the ICANN Bylaws;
- Section 7.4 (d) of the ICANN Bylaws;
- Fully cooperate to undergo a due diligence screening by an external provider, which includes providing necessary consent to ICANN to transmit personal data to the due diligence provider.
Candidates need to be aware that they will be approached by the external due diligence provider to sign a consent form before the actual due diligence will begin. The scope of this background check is described in: https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/proposed-uniform-board-integrity-screening-process-02mar18-en.pdf. In the event a candidate does not provide consent or rescinds the consent to undergo the due diligence process, the Council will be informed, and the candidacy of that person will be ended. After completion of the due diligence process, the Chair of the ccNSO Council will be informed of the outcome and inform the Council (with the exception of a potential candidate who is still a Councillor), i.e., only whether concerns have surfaced, which warrant further consideration and decisions.
Candidate Statements
The Nomination Manager will ask candidate(s) to provide a written Candidate Statement. A Q&A session will be held at the upcoming ccNSO Members Meeting at ICANN66 in Montréal, Canada. The Q&A session gives the ccNSO members and broader ccTLD community an opportunity to interact with the candidates. Consult here the agenda of the ICANN66 ccNSO Members Meeting. In preparation of the Q&A session, the written candidate statements will be posted on the ccNSO website.
Elections
Bylaw Article 10 – Section 10.3 (i) states:
"(i) The ccNSO Council shall nominate individuals to fill Seats 11 and 12 on the Board by written ballot or by action at a meeting; any such nomination must have affirmative votes of a majority of all the members of the ccNSO Council then in office. Notification of the ccNSO Council's nominations shall be given by the ccNSO Council Chair in writing to the EC Administration, with a copy to the Secretary, and the EC shall promptly act on it as provided in Section 7.25."
Even if there is only one candidate nominated for seat number 11, an election will be held, to allow the ccNSO members to either cast their vote for the candidate, or to select the option "none of the above".
The ccNSO Council and ccNSO members have agreed that the ccNSO members shall propose and elect candidates for the two ICANN Board seats allocated to the ccNSO, and that the winner of said election - i.e. the candidate that receives the majority of the votes cast - shall in turn be nominated to the ICANN Board seat by a majority vote of the ccNSO Council. The timeline for the elections is posted in the links-section below: further instructions will be provided by the Nomination Manager closer to the start of the elections, in January 2020.
Links
Joke Braeken, the Nomination Manager