Africa Internet Governance Forum 2022

The internet is meaningful when people not only access the internet, but also experience the full benefits of the internet in their own language. This is possible by achieving Universal Acceptance (UA) globally.
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Nelson Mandela: “If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his own language, that goes to his heart.” --------
The majority of the world does not speak English as a first language. There are billions of people who prefer to read, write, and communicate in languages other than English, such as Arabic, Chinese, Cyrillic, Devanagari, or in other scripts.
“The Internet is for all”. It is not only for English speaking people. What “Internet For All” means is that everyone in this global Internet can find themselves with their own identity, language and script for their chosen domain name and e-mail address. The internet is meaningful when people not only access the internet, but also experience the full benefits of the internet in their own language. This is possible by achieving Universal Acceptance (UA) globally.
Universal Acceptance is the cornerstone to a multilingual Internet by ensuring all domain names and email addresses - in any language, script, or character length (e.g., .Africa, .рф, .Photography) - are accepted equally by all Internet-enabled applications, devices and systems. Achieving UA ensures every person has the ability to navigate and communicate on the Internet using their chosen domain name and email address that best aligns with their interests, business, culture, language and script. With Universal Acceptance, the Internet can become meaningful, and this is possible if all of us contribute. If one system supports Universal Acceptance, but the other does not, the machines connected to the internet cannot communicate with each other. Universal Acceptance cannot be achieved by just one person or entity. To make the internet Universal Acceptance ready, It requires efforts by all of us.