The idea was that to be a stakeholder in the management of DNS you have to be a domain registrant. The idea was that ICANN's DNSO/GNSO was not a generalized representation of Internet users but a representation of domain name holders. General internet users were supposed to be represented via the At Large.

Agreed. I have made the leadership of the African region of At-Large aware of the rejection, and I hope they will encourage James to submit an application for Kasweaha to become an At-Large Structure.

Why should people who do not even have domains be establishing policy preferences for people who do?

That's a very interesting question, well beyond answering in this thread.

- Evan