Elections were UWSA's version of Gong Show
By Ken Birchall
Former UWSA law rep
March 26, 2008
Readers remembering a back and forth of words earlier in the school year between a certain editor and I – can guess the level of respect I hold for the way The Lance operates. That feeling is still there, but this does not mean I was happy with the referendum question. That the CRO and execs did not inform The Lance, or advertise the question sufficiently is sad but not surprising given who they are and the way they perform.
The referendum question was an excuse for people who should know better but are lazy and preferred going through the motions to excuse a ‘wait and see’ approach to hand it on to the next year.
The Lance exists as essentially a ‘division’ of the UWSA and more importantly the UWSA controls its accounts. Council working in concert with the executives and could have struck a committee, consulted with experts on how to adopt best practices and then implemented them months ago. That is exactly what I suggested when Spencer Hills presented the petition to force a referendum question.
The election in general more than the referendum is what stretched the boundaries of reality. Council never addressed the majority of the first EMC’s written concerns and was happy instead slapping a less than effective Band-Aid on some profound problems both before and after the election.
The problems of the CRO deciding to take policy making into his own hands or ignoring rules were worsened by the fact that the first emergency meeting never happened. If the sort of leadership on student interests to be expected from Tiffany Gooch was demonstrated when she ignored the idea of conflict of interest and voted not to waive notice, then I’m glad I won’t be here to see another year of the ongoing UWSA executive Gong Show.
It’s strange people aspiring to ‘leadership’ positions with vested interests in the outcome did not feel compelled to honour Article 7 of the UWSA Constitution, or demonstrate their professed leadership then or now and call the election the fraud it risked becoming and did, except in private.
The CRO seemingly violated as many policies as he followed but it isn’t like it started recently. It started in the Fall and from the start he was bending the rules when not outright breaking them.
The CRO was obligated to conduct by-elections, which may have happened were it the case that the Chair and Council been properly informed. But further he gave misleading advice to members elected to serve the UWSA at Senate, specifically that they can resign from their Council responsibilities.
Justin before you write a letter calling me a liar, one of the Senators named “Justin” as the source of information in a letter I provided to The Lance so unless you can suggest who else that was given the context of that letter I suggest you just go back to boring someone else with your usual lies.
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