Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
| Subscribe: Newsletters & News Alerts | ICANN Blog | Public Comment
| Subscribe: Newsletters & News Alerts | ICANN Blog | Public Comment
Mohamed Sharil Tarmizi
Mohamed Sharil Tarmizi is Chairman of the Government Advisory Committee (GAC) in ICANN and is the liason from the GAC to the ICANN Board. Sharil was elected to the position of GAC Chair in December 2002 and was subsequently reelected for a second and final term in 2005 in Mar del Plata, Argentina. He will end his term as GAC Chair in March 2007 at the ICANN meeting in Lisbon, Portugal and will be succeeded by Ambassador Janis Karklins from Latvia, in March 2007 .
Sharil is a Malaysian national who until April 2006 served as the Senior Advisor in the Office of the Chairman and General Manager in the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), the communications and multimedia industry regulator in Malaysia. He left the employ of the MCMC in April 2006 and is now with a strategic and financial advisory firm called BinaFikir. In recognition of the critical phase of his Chairmanship and in the interest of continuity in the GAC, Sharil was appointed by the MCMC to be a special envoy for Malaysia with full government status.
On 1 May 2006, Sharil was appointed by the Minister of Energy, Water and Communications, Malaysia to the position of a Commission Member in the MCMC.
He is one of the seven Commissioners serving on the Board of MCMC. He will serve as a Commissioner for a term of two years from the date of appointment.
Whilst he was a senior staff member in MCMC from May 2000 to April 2006, he led new development initiatives such as the developent of the convergence legislation in Malaysia, a first in the world; licensing migration to a convergence framework, 3G mobile systems, broadband initiatives, capacity building programmes on bridging the digital divide and self regulation in the communications and multimedia sector within the MCMC.
Sharil is also involved in numerous international developmental initiatives and is actively involved in various international speaking and training engagements. He has collaborated with numerous international and intergovernmental organisations such as the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the Commonwealth Telecoms Organisation (CTO), the Asia Pacific Telecommunity (APT), the Pacific Telecoms Council (PTC), the Pacific Islands Telecoms Association (PITA), the Asia Pacific Network Information Centre (APNIC), InfoDev and the World Bank, to name a few.
During his tenure in the GAC, the GAC has seen an increase in membership from approximately 45 or so members to over 110 governments, distinct economies recognised in international fora and intergovernmental organisations.
Sharil has been involved in ICANN process since the year 2000 and has served in various capacities within ICANN, in particular on issues relating to Internationalised Domain Names where he was involved in the early development of identifying problems in their deployment.
Prior to his position in the MCMC, Sharil was an attorney specializing in construction law and privatization of utilities before moving on to communications, multimedia and e-commerce issues and has acted in an advisory capacity to multinational clients on domestic and foreign projects.
Sharil was also involved in advising multinational clients on their participation in the Multimedia Super Corridor Project and was particularly involved in two out of the seven initial MSC Flagship Projects in Malaysia.
Sharil graduated with an LL.B(Hons) from the University of Wales, Aberystwyth and is a Barrister from Gray's Inn, United Kingdom.