Last night, Chief Returning Officer (CRO) Alex Flor assigned a total of 29 demerit points to five members of Team Unite for alleged violations of the Elections Procedure Code (EPC) following an interview with The Varsity.
Ye Huang, Team Unite’s candidate for president, and Nicky Bhatty, the team’s candidate for VP external were each assigned 10 demerit points. Five for “failure to follow grievance procedure,” 3 for “intentional misrepresentation of facts,” 1 for “misrepresentation of fact,” and 1 for “unapproved material.”
Pierre Harfouche, candidate for VP university affairs; Baliqis Hashiru, candidate for VP equity; and Anna Yin, candidate for VP internal and services were each assigned 3 demerit points, one each for “intentional misrepresentation of facts,” “misrepresentation of fact,” and “unapproved material.”
An executive candidate who receives more than 35 demerit points is automatically disqualified.
In the decision Flor stated that demerit points for failure to follow the grievance procedure and intentional misrepresentation of facts were assigned because the candidates contacted The Varsity and provided information which she says “was false and was descriptive of an unresolved situation.” The information in question related to claims that she had blocked Unite from releasing campaign materials and had been unavailable for much of the day.
She went on to state that the demerit points for misrepresentation of facts and unapproved material were assigned for “using The Varsity to spread platform information that had yet to receive approval by the Chief Returning Officer.”
Flor added that “these violations are serious as they undermine members’ faith in the elections,” but added that the number of points assigned was in light of the fact that the alleged violations took place on the first day of campaigning.
When asked for comment, Munib Sajjad, current UTSU president and Chair of the Elections and Referenda Committee, responded on behalf of Flor, saying: “The Chief Returning Officer is unable to respond at this time due to other duties.”
Sajjad explained the thought process behind the demerit points. “[Varsity reporter Theodore] Yan informed the CRO at 17:22 that he was told by Team Unite that their campaign materials were not approved. As provided for in CRO Ruling 001, the CRO found that this constituted a breach of the elections rules of fair play,” he said. “Additionally, the grievance procedure was not followed, as the CRO was not made aware there was a dispute with the conditional approval of campaign materials sent to members of ‘Team Unite.'”
“Demerit points are meant to discourage behaviour that is in violation of campaign rule detrimental to the electoral process, or the electorate,” he continued.
According to Vip Vigneswaran, campaign manager for Unite, the CRO suggested to Team Unite that Huang and Bhatty appeal the ruling. Bhatty plans to appeal the ruling, while Huang does not.
“I’m going to be emailing the CRO, or whoever I need to email, to appeal the decision, just to understand why it was that I got 10 demerit points in comparison to the rest of my team,” said Bhatty, adding: “While talking to the CRO today, she suggested to both Ye and I that we lobby for an appeal, simply because some of the sources she may have received aren’t necessarily too trusted.”
“It was an unfortunate situation,” Bhatty continued. “We’re working to either resolve it or continue on with our campaign.”
Last night, the CRO also released a statement addressed to UTSU members. This statement lists a number of points from an article published last night in The Varsity which she believes are inaccurate. The Varsity has not issued any corrections to that article.
Cameron Wathey, candidate for VP, internal on Team U of T Voice, commented on the campaign material approval process for his own slate. “We want to be clear that Team Voice did not receive approvals for all of our campaign materials, which meant the launch of our website and whole platform was delayed,” Wathey said, adding: “For example, we had indicated on our website that members of our team had helped “phase out flat fees in arts and science” and the CRO informed us that this claim was a misrepresentation because flat fees would still apply at a threshold of 4.0 credits.”
Wathey said Team U of T Voice would leave it up to Team Unite to appeal the demerit point rulings. Wathey went on to add: “We believe there are two issues here — one is whether or not demerit points are warranted for a specific offense, which is up to the CRO and the ERC, and the second is whether or not the Elections Procedure Code is upheld and applied fairly to all candidates.”
