“Choice for more” slate triumphs in UMSU election
Chelsea Moore Staff
Photo by David Lipnowski.
After a tiresome week of campaign scuffling, the ballots are in, and students at the University of Manitoba have officially chosen their new student union representatives for next year. The election took place from March 1 to 3, and with an overwhelming majority, Garry Sran took 1982 of the 2871 votes placed for UMSU president.
“It’s exciting,” said Sran. “It’s something that at the beginning of the election I knew that I could do, something that I could bring to UMSU.”
Patrick Smith, the other candidate for UMSU president, received 710 votes.
“I’m very proud of the campaign that we ran,” said Smith. “I think that we campaigned with integrity, and I think that we got our message across in an effective manner.”
Smith added that, “ultimately, the U of M students decided.”
The voter turnout for UMSU president this year, however, was nearly 1,100 less than last year, which raises some concerns among UMSU members.
“The voter turnout could have been better,” said Sran. It’s something that we can build on, and hopefully get more students out next year.”
Sran suggested that more polling stations on campus could increase the number of students who participate in UMSU elections.
For the second of two contested positions, Amanda Jonson received 2028 votes to become vice-president (internal), besting candidate Jim Barnby’s 660 votes.
Christian Butera received 2864 votes as the sole candidate for vice-president (advocacy); Rachel Gotthilf received 2420 for vice-president (external), and Melanie Rollins received 2869 votes for vice-president (student services).
For each of the positions, between 144 and 181 ballots were spoiled.
Caitlin Brown, chief returning officer for the election, said that although there was no fraud on the part of voters, campaigners on both sides broke election regulations, and not without penalty.
One complaint lodged by Amanda Jonson involved a campaign video that was played in a classroom without approval.
“I sat down and had a discussion with them about the video,” said Brown, “told them what was wrong with it, told them the amendments they needed to make before my final approval . . . and they proceeded to play it the next day without my approval.
“So that was kind of a blatant disregard for my ruling there,” said Brown.
Rachel Heinrichs, the “choice for more” campaign manager, registered a complaint about the consultation of a lawyer by the Smith/Barnby slate, which supercedes campaign expenses, which was later invalidated.
Another complaint received was that some Smith/Barnby campaign volunteers were distributing unauthorized materials.
The net result of these bylaw infractions was the reduction of campaign time by 48 hours for the Smith/Barnby slate. Both candidates were prohibited from campaigning during the final two days of the election, March 2 and 3.
The “choice for more” slate also had a banner up in a prohibited space in the engineering building.
“It wasn’t the easiest election to run,” said Brown.
The new international students’ representative for next year will be Xiao Ran Liu, who took 264 votes in last week’s UMSU election.
Jason Van Roy won for the position of LGBTT representative, with 737 votes. Noel Bruce received 696 votes for the position of Aboriginal representative. Robin Dourn took 1253 votes for women’s representative, and for students with disabilities, Christen Roos won with 1884 votes.
The multiple ballots that were used in the election were confusing to some people and, according to Brown, raised some complaints.
“Without the multiple ballots it would have taken us, you know, 12, 13 hours to do the counting,” said Brown.
Brown mentioned that for the next election, having more staff would be a good idea, and also “a larger awareness” for the executive and community positions.
In the future UMSU elections, Smith noted that “greater communication between the candidates and the EDIE [Elections, Discipline, Interpretation and Enforcement] board” is something that he would like to see changed.
Sran agreed. “The [bylaws] need work . . . maybe more clarity on the election rules in terms of posters and by-rules.” The election bylaws were almost entirely new this election, having been amended over the winter.
More detailed information about the election, including the number of votes tendered at each polling station, was not available at press time, but is expected in the next week.
