Not exempted from its share of electoral controversy, the fairness of UTSC election proceedings and the competence of the university’s Chief Returning Officer, Min Showkat, were questioned by candidate Daniel M. Addams’ alleged wrongful disqualification.
Untimely disqualification
On February 15, a day before the Feb. 16 – 18 voting period, Addams, who ran for VP academics, was pulled out from the race for not having enough valid signatures in his nomination form.
Instead of providing 25 signatures, which declared one an eligible candidate, a cross-check performed by the Elections Committee composed of the CRO and two DROs found that Addams only had 24 valid names supporting his nomination.
Though he originally supplied 26 signatures, two were invalidated respectively because of illegible writing and one for coming from a St. George student.
“Showkat, the CRO, waited until February 15, the very last day before voting to tell me that I was ineligible,” said Addams, who will be reimbursed for his campaign costs.
According to the Article 2.01.10 of the Elections Policy, the CRO must “ensure that each candidate is eligible for election […] within two business days following the deadline for nominations.”
As the deadline was on January 26, the candidates should have been informed of issues concerning their eligibility on January 28 at the latest.
Haroon Rahman, one of the two DROs, believed that Addams’ late disqualification was the university’s fault and not Showkat’s or the Election Committee’s.
He explained that they were not able to get a hold of the student list until the university provided it two days before the voting period.
“I do feel that it’s wrong that he was disqualified a day before the elections when he already put in all the work but you [have to] understand that if your signatures aren’t in the list then you can’t continue running,” Rahman said.
John Aruldason, SCSU president and elections liaison, also sympathized with Addams but thought the committee acted accordingly.
“It is unfortunate that that was the situation but even though we only received the student list two days before voting, we informed him right away after getting it.”
Aruldason admitted that getting timely information from the university was the problem and that the CRO has started a motion to improve it.
“One of the recommendations brought forth by the CRO in his report to the Board on how to improve the electoral process is to get the [student list] earlier to prevent something like this from happening.”
In last year’s SCSU election, VP students and equity candidate Martine Lee was disqalified after recieving a late notice of insufficient signatures. Lee was denied an appeal, although the appeals committee decided she shouldn’t be disqualified.
Failure to fulfill duties
Addams also reported that during the election, Showkat failed to fulfill his two other duties as CRO.
“During the All Candidates’ Meeting, the CRO was supposed to give us a copy of By-law #2, which specified the whole elections process. But I had to get my own copy from the SCSU website.”
Written in Article 2.01.05 of the Elections Policy, the CRO must provide each candidate a hard copy of the Elections Policy and By-law #2 to acquaint them with “rules pertaining to the elections and the elections appeals process.”
“He also refused to give his phone number and said something along the lines of ‘my email is my phone number,’” said Addams, who did not know at the time that according to the policy, Showkat was responsible “for maintaining an email account and phone number (with voicemail).”
Rahman mentioned that he gave Addams his and the CRO’s numbers but denied the accusation that the CRO did not perform his job properly.
“I don’t remember if the CRO provided his number in the All Candidates’ Meeting but he must have as all the candidates were communicating with him through his cell phone number during the elections,” reasoned Rahman.
“Unprofessionalism”
After his disqualification, Addams sent the elections committee an appeal, which he said Showkat responded to via a Facebook wall post.
“I urged [the committee] to rule on my appeal on a timely fashion but the CRO took his time and he unprofessionally responded to me through my Facebook campaign group,” he said.
Showkat’s comment stated that Addams’ disqualification was the candidate’s own fault: “…every candidate followed the procedure. As you failed to do so, you were disqualified and the reasons you have states [sic] and are asking the election committee to throw out the elections are on no basis related to the reason in which you were disqualified [sic]. You made it very clear to the elections committee that you were in a rush to submit your candidate form and you were unaware of the proper protocols. This is your fault and nobody elses [sic]. The decision stays.”
Unfounded Accusations
“As a part of the elections committee, we followed everything in the policies. I understand that [Addams] really wanted to run for the position but he got disqualified on reasonable terms,” said Rahman.
Though admitting that he was not familiar with details of the miscommunication between Addams and Showkat on Facebook, Aruldason also believed that there was no foul play and that the matter was caused by an “upset candidate.”
Rahman agreed, saying that Addams was “just letting his emotions take over” ever since his disqualification.
“Overall, the CRO did a good job,” concluded Aruldason.
“He fulfilled his responsibilities in the elections in terms of explaining to the candidates how the election will run, facilitating the actual electoral process, treating all candidates equally, and ensuring the security of the ballots and the integrity of the election.”
Showkat declined to comment.
