A newly elected Students’ Administrative Council (SAC) director from the Erindale campus has been disqualified after a ruling by the elections committee last Tuesday evening.
Melissa Shaw, running with the New Student Union (NSU) ticket, was disqualified, along with her supporters, UTM vice-presidential candidate Marium Azimi and Erindale College Student Union (ECSU) presidential candidate Mark Fahmy. According to the elections committee, the three violated election rules during a bizarre altercation on March 12.
The trio set up a table at a popular campus gathering spot in the South Building on March 10. Tables can only be set up in the building by campus clubs, and they must ask permission of Saira Qureshi, the ECSU clubs commissioner. The table in question was registered to Erindale’s Political Science Students Association.
Qureshi said the candidates applied for the table under false pretences: “On Monday I passed the table and NSU was set up, distributing their information and signing up members. On asking for more information it was obvious that the person manning the table [Azimi] had no idea about any ‘seminar.’”
Instead, according to Qureshi, the table was being used to encourage students to vote for NSU candidates—which meant it had to be taken down. “On Monday I requested Ms. Azimi to remove the table, which she agreed to, after a lengthy phone call with Mark Fahmy. I presumed they would keep their word and left,” Qureshi said.
But the table was still there Wednesday at the start of the voting—and a laptop was set up, with a link to the election Web site. According to elections committee member and SAC vice-president education Emoline Thiruchelvam, no candidate can be sitting within 20 feet of a polling station during voting. The committee ruled that the computer—which was connected to the Internet and had a Web site link to the voting site ROSI—was a polling station. In addition, the table had campaign literature on it and the candidates were sitting at it. When Qureshi asked campus police to dismantle the table, Fahmy became confrontational and campus police were called.
According to Fahmy, the ruling was unfair. “Melissa signed the permit form before she was a candidate of SAC. She did nothing of conflict of interest. We did everything by the book; we played by their rules…. We asked what a ‘SAC-sanctioned polling station’ was and they didn’t answer.” Fahmy said the ruling was an attempt to punish NSU for its criticisms of the effectiveness of SAC at UTM.
“I was under the impression of just losing demerit points,” said Shaw, who is also a member of the Political Science Students Association. “I was taken aback. I called the [chief returning officer] on Monday and he said I was not going to be disqualified.” She added, “This shows students what SAC is like. I think they had planned it from the beginning. There’s nothing I can do about it, but I plan to appeal the decision.” Shaw said no voting took place from the laptop. Mohammed Hashim, the newly elected SAC vice-president representing Erindale, agreed with the committee’s ruling. “To be honest, when people are cheating and setting up polling stations…this goes against the spirit of the election. The procedure code states that.”
