The Executive Director of Media Rights Agenda (MRA), Mr. Edetaen Ojo, has been appointed a member of the Advisory Network of the Freedom Online Coalition, a partnership of 30 governments from around the world, working to advance Internet freedom, including respect for the right to freedom of expression and rights to association, assembly, and privacy online, worldwide.
The FOC Advisory Network was recently established as a key mechanism for the Coalition to engage regularly with non-governmental Internet stakeholders and will serve as a platform for multi-stakeholder dialogue which will provide advice to the FOC, organize multi-stakeholder collaboration around FOC activities and explore possibilities for cooperation.
Mr. Ojo is one of 30 individuals from around the world that have been selected to be members of the Network, which will be co-chaired by Katharine Kendrick, currently International Public Policy Manager at Airbnb, and Matthew Shears who is the Director of the Global Internet Policy and Human Rights Project at the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT).
The Coalition is a group of governments that have committed to work together to support Internet freedom and protect fundamental human rights, particularly the rights to freedom of expression, association, assembly, and privacy online worldwide.
It was established in 2011 at the inaugural Freedom Online Conference in The Hague, the Netherlands, at the initiative of the Dutch Foreign Ministry and now has 30 member governments across Africa, Asia, Europe, the Americas, and the Middle East.
All member states have signed the FOC founding document, namely the Freedom Online: Joint Action for Free Expression on the Internet and have committed themselves to the principle that the human rights people have offline are the same online.
Member governments of the FOC are currently those of Argentina, Australia, Austria, Canada, Costa Rica, The Czech Republic, Estonia, France, Georgia, Germany, Ghana, Ireland, Japan, Kenya, Latvia, Lithuania, The Maldives, Mexico, Mongolia, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Tunisia, the United Kingdom and the United States of America.
The specific objectives of the FOC-AN are:
To serve as a mechanism for multi-stakeholder advice on the aims, objectives and activities of the FOC, and pertinent issues related to human rights online;
To support the FOC’s mission of advancing human rights online through stakeholder engagement; and
To be instrumental in ensuring multi-stakeholder engagement in the planning and organization of and participate in FOC Conferences, as well as other FOC events and meetings.
