[ga] approval of Ombudsman?

["Edward Hasbrouck" <edward@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

A mysterious item has appeared on the Board meeting page in the agenda for 
the 6 March 2009 Board meeting in Mexico City: "Approval of Ombudsman". 

I suspect this means that ICANN has finally noticed from my recent 
comments on the abolition of the Reconsideration Committee that they have 
never appointed an Ombudsman, and have thus been in violation of their 
Bylaws. I don't know why they have finally noticed or decided to act.

There is no formal proposal yet posted for the appointment of an 
Ombudsman. It will be interesting to see how ICANN tries to explain why it 
is only now, years late, appointing an Ombudsman, whether it allows public 
comment on the proposed choice of an Ombudsman -- or why the person who 
has been acting as Ombudsman paid so little attention to the Bylaws or 
precedural due process that he didn't notice that he was required to be 
appointed by vote of the Board. 

In any event, since the (illegal) "incumbent" is clearly unqualified, it's 
apparently now time for the community, or would-be candidates themselves, 
to put forward nominations for the position of ICANN Ombudsman -- if you 
can figure out the correct point of contact for such nominations.

I pointed out the failure to have a properly appointed Ombudsman in 2007 
on this GA list, and in other comments to ICANN:

http://gnso.icann.org/mailing-lists/archives/ga/msg06893.html

I have more comments on this at ICANNwatch:

http://www.icannwatch.org/article.pl?sid=09/02/24/0023205


----------------
Edward Hasbrouck
<edward@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
<http://hasbrouck.org>
+1-415-824-0214