[Chapter-delegates] Final ChAC Steering Committee Election Results (was: Re: Petition against the ChAC Steering Committee Elections Results 2026
Christine Saegesser
saegesser at isoc.org
Fri Nov 21 04:17:20 PST 2025
Dear Colleagues,
Please find below a message from Agang K. Ditlhogo, the 2026 ChAC SC Nominations and Elections Chair:
===================
Dear all,
We’d like to thank you all, and in particular Alphonce Odhiambo and Karim Attoumani Mohamed, for your commitment to good community governance, as well as the strengthening of future processes in a spirit of transparency, fairness, and accountability.
The 2026 ChAC SC Elections Report<https://isoc.box.com/s/yxapxgce6pn1k0modjvx5kutz3zzeqdq> was shared via this list that reaches all approx. 700 current chapter leaders worldwide. The report was also discussed with the Full ChAC on their 18 November call.
In my capacity as the 2026 ChAC Nominations and Elections Chair, I feel very confident that this report includes the necessary elements that support an open and transparent election and I therefore confirm that the election results can be considered final.
We very much appreciate the guidance received during this process in support of best practice. Both the ChAC and staff supporting the ChAC are always eager to improve how things are done to ensure good governance best practice.
In this perspective, we encourage you to share any related topics and suggestions for future improvements with the ChAC by submitting a ChAC topic via the ChAC topic suggestion list<https://isoc.box.com/s/13jmw7oqytt4ukzc5qvf8fvwdqu5mtdt>.
Thank you all for all your input and support of this process. We look forward to working with the elected 2026 ChAC Steering Committee.
Congratulations to all members joining the incoming team and a big thank you to all 2025 ChAC Steering Committee members for their work in support of the global chapter community in 2025!
Best regards,
Agang K. Ditlhogo
2026 ChAC SC Nominations and Elections Chair
On 18 Nov 2025, at 18:31, Christine Saegesser <saegesser at isoc.org<mailto:saegesser at isoc.org>> wrote:
Dear Alphonce,
We do take your petition against the 2026 ChAC Steering Committee Election Results very seriously and have therefore, as promised, compiled a full report about the elections. This report includes responses to the questions you raise below and can be found here: https://isoc.box.com/s/yxapxgce6pn1k0modjvx5kutz3zzeqdq
This report was also shared with the ChAC SC Nominations and Elections Chair and the detailed election results are also available on the 2026 ChAC Steering Committee Candidates page here: https://isoc.box.com/s/gtfmyzakmg39gtuj696yiu4it5jjqhqh
Based on this report, we remain convinced that the 2026 ChAC Steering Committee elections were held in an open, transparent and inclusive manner, in line with the related rules and guidelines.
For full clarity, we’d like to hop on a quick call with you tomorrow, Wednesday, to go over the various points in the report. Please let me know via saegesser at isoc.org<mailto:saegesser at isoc.org> what time would work best for you for this call.
We look forward to talking to you soon.
Best,
Christine
Christine Saegesser Baethge, Sr. Director Chapters and Special Interest Groups
saegesser at isoc.org<mailto:saegesser at isoc.org>
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On 18 Nov 2025, at 13:37, Alphonce Odhiambo <odhiambo4305 at gmail.com<mailto:odhiambo4305 at gmail.com>> wrote:
Dear Christine.
Thank you for your response and clarification and admitting that the issues I raised actually arose during the election process. However, these are some of the things we can square in the future elections, it is also clear that their occurrence affected this current election and therefore puts this election's outcome into question as to whether it was credible, and transparent or not.
I am therefore continuing to ask for further clarifications as to whether the issues raised affected the final results and jeopardized the election's integrity.
Second to that I would ask why couldn't this election results be nullified or dismissed now that you have admitted that it was faced with challenges that put a big question to its integrity.
As we wait to see additional records (which I think could have been readily available by now because they were used to reliably declare winners), I petition for the dismissal / nullification of this election and that a fresh election be held upon rectifying issues raised here and in other emails shared earlier.
Thank you
On Mon, Nov 17, 2025 at 12:54 PM Christine Saegesser <saegesser at isoc.org<mailto:saegesser at isoc.org>> wrote:
Dear Alphonce,
Thank you for your message. We fully agree that it is fundamental for the ChAC Steering Committee elections (and any other community elections, including chapter leadership elections) to be conducted in an open, transparent and inclusive manner, with clear rules and guidelines. We are confident that this was the case for this year’s ChAC SC elections and will be working with this year's ChAC SC Nominations and Elections Chair, Agang K. Ditlhogo from Botswana (and previous ChAC SC member herself), to share more details in response to your petition.
Here some quick initial reactions to your points below:
1. Use of exact terminology:
Thank you for pointing this out. This is important indeed and we will make sure to revise the wording of these messages for future election processes.
In the meantime, let me clarify:
* The ChAC Steering Committee candidates were nominated (or self-nominated) by the current ChAC representatives
* The ChAC representatives then voted (on behalf of their chapter) to elect the 9 ChAC Steering Committee members
* No one was appointed or selected in this process and we apologise for the misleading terminology used. We will make sure to revise the wording of these messages for future election processes.
2. Request for additional details surrounding the elections:
We will work with the Nominations and Elections Chair on the best way to share more details about the election outcomes, participation rates, etc.
3. Technical error with some of the “regret” messages.
This is weird and I apologise for any confusion this may have caused. I’ll work with the team to ensure we understand what happened to avoid similar errors in the future.
The list of ChAC SC members elected is the following, as communicated via the chapter-delegates list on 11 November:
* Regional representative North America - Joel Templeman (Canada Manitoba Chapter)
* Regional representative Europe - Jordi Domingo-Pascual (Spain Catalonia Chapter)
* Regional representative LAC - Flávio Rech Wagner (Brazil Chapter)
* Regional representative Africa - Maud Adjeley Ashong Elliot (Ghana Chapter)
* Regional representative APAC - Dr. N. Sudha Bhuvaneswari (India Chennai Chapter)
* Regional representative Middle East - Heba Sayed Ahmed (Egypt Chapter)
* Non-geographical representative - Alejandra Stolk (Venezuela Chapter)
* Non-geographical representative - Katarina Gevorgyan (Armenia Chapter)
* Non-geographical representative - Thilina Dhanushka Kalahe Pathirana (Norway Chapter)
To ensure diversity, the candidate with the most votes from each region has been elected as the regional representative, the three candidates with the next highest vote counts were elected as non-geographical representatives. The aim of this process is to ensure diversity (see also the ChAC Charter<https://www.internetsociety.org/chapters/chapters-advisory-council/charter/>). There will be no difference with regards to their role on the Steering Committee itself.
We hope this helps and will be in touch with Agang, the ChAC SC Nominations and Elections Chair for additional details.
Best,
Christine
Christine Saegesser Baethge, Sr. Director Chapters and Special Interest Groups
saegesser at isoc.org<mailto:saegesser at isoc.org>
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On 16 Nov 2025, at 17:38, Alphonce Odhiambo via Chapter-delegates <chapter-delegates at elists.isoc.org<mailto:chapter-delegates at elists.isoc.org>> wrote:
Dear Elections committee.
My name is Alphonce Odhiambo , ISOC Kenya Chapter President and Chapter's ChAC Representative.
Kenya Chapter participated in the just concluded ChAC Steering Committee 2026 elections and based on the provisional results the following conflicting observations that requires clarification has been made as follows;-
1. The use of terms , Appointed and Selected as quoted below is in contrast to the expected terms like Elected. According to our observation this means that apart from Chapter participating in Elections, some backdoor exercises were done which include Appointing Selecting members in various positions without clear provisions.
---Ref 1
The polls for the 2026 Chapters Advisory Council Steering Committee (ChAC SC) elections closed on November 6, 2025. This election filled nine positions on the Steering Committee: one representative per region and three non-geographical representatives.
To ensure diversity, the candidate with the most votes from each region has been appointed as the regional representative, while the three candidates with the next highest vote counts were selected as non-geographical representatives.
--End ref 1
2. The elections committee has not tabled before the ChAC members the election outcome that gave birth to the given names. We lack numbers and statistics that can describe the final results; the questions we are asking as very simple; How many many Chapters participated ? How many reminders of ballots were sent? How many ballots were opened? How many Chapters voted? How many did not vote? What was the individual candidate score? At the start of the voting, how secure was the voting system (what can prove that it was transparent, verifiable and accountable and tamperproof) ?
3. We noticed that emails sent to candidates informing them that they did not win had errors and individual candidates received emails that were not meant for them - for instance, I received regret emails sent to other candidates. Another email was also sent claiming that it was a system error or confusion.
---Ref 2
Hello,
I want to apologize for a technical error in the previous message: the name in the greeting (“Dear [Name],”) was populated incorrectly due to a technical error. I’m sorry for any confusion this may have caused.
Please note that the content of the message is still accurate: the election results as communicated remain correct.
Thank you for your understanding,
Rama
--- End Ref 2
----------------Ref 3:
Dear Abdou,
Thank you sincerely for your willingness to serve on the 2026 Chapters Advisory Council Steering Committee.
While we regret to inform you that you were not among the nine elected candidates this year, we deeply appreciate your commitment and interest in supporting the Council’s work. Your dedication to the community and to advancing our shared goals is valued, and we hope you’ll consider standing as a candidate in the future.
The official announcement of the election results will be shared with all chapter leaders by 11 November.
With gratitude,
Agang K. Ditlhogo
Chair, Nominations and Elections
Rama Rejman
Community Compliance and Governance Specialist, Community Engagement
Internet Society
Dear Alphonce,
Thank you sincerely for your willingness to serve on the 2026 Chapters Advisory Council Steering Committee.
While we regret to inform you that you were not among the nine elected candidates this year, we deeply appreciate your commitment and interest in supporting the Council’s work. Your dedication to the community and to advancing our shared goals is valued, and we hope you’ll consider standing as a candidate in the future.
The official announcement of the election results will be shared with all chapter leaders by 11 November.
With gratitude,
Agang K. Ditlhogo
Chair, Nominations and Elections
Rama Rejman
Community Compliance and Governance Specialist, Community Engagement
Internet Society
Dear Ashirwad,
Thank you sincerely for your willingness to serve on the 2026 Chapters Advisory Council Steering Committee.
While we regret to inform you that you were not among the nine elected candidates this year, we deeply appreciate your commitment and interest in supporting the Council’s work. Your dedication to the community and to advancing our shared goals is valued, and we hope you’ll consider standing as a candidate in the future.
The official announcement of the election results will be shared with all chapter leaders by 11 November.
With gratitude,
Agang K. Ditlhogo
Chair, Nominations and Elections
Rama Rejman
Community Compliance and Governance Specialist, Community Engagement
Internet Society
---End Ref 3
Generally we need to have ISOC which is transparent, inclusive and open with clear Standard Operation Standards especially at the higher levels (Regional and Global) so that local chapters can emulate best practices and standards set from the top levels.
How we expect our local Chapters to behave and act otherwise if they can clearly see, copy and paste some of these gaps.
As Kenya Chapter and in my position as Candidate, I do not acknowledge the results until the above concerns are addressed with utmost clarity and honesty based on factual data.
--
Kind Regards,
------------------------------------
Eng. Alphonce Odhiambo.
Founder,
GONLINE AFRICA
www.gonline.africa<https://www.gonline.africa/>
President,
Internet Society Kenya Chapter.
_____________________________________
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Kind Regards,
------------------------------------
Eng. Alphonce Odhiambo.
Founder,
GONLINE AFRICA
www.gonline.africa<https://www.gonline.africa/>
President,
Internet Society Kenya Chapter.
_____________________________________
---Confidentiality, Integrity, Accountability---
Money is a by-product of the value you add to the society
+254 740216370, +254 100 393 693
LinkedIn<http://www.linkedin.com/in/eng-alphonce> | Twitter<http://www.twitter.com/Eng_alphonce>
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