In the past three weeks here at Carleton University, the undergraduate students have gone through a lot of drama especially when it comes to their student association. I personally find that there is an immense amount of miscommunication going around the school community, be it intentional or otherwise. This article is really in direct response to last week’s “Electoral Board’s uneasy slant against Bruce.” Within this there are many mistakes that I wish to clear up before any of the next steps are taken.
 

Let it be clear that when Bruce Kyereh-Addo was disqualified from the Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA) presidential election, the election was already done. In a Facebook message from Heather Murley, Chief Electoral Officer, she said “Bruce was disqualified on Thursday (Feb 12) night, and was informed before 9a.m. on Friday morning. All action was taken before the ballot boxes were even opened to start tabulation.”
 

I find that to be absolute crap that supporters of Demand Better say that the CEO disqualified Bruce so that her “friends” could continue to rule CUSA. The disqualification occurred before anything was counted and before she could have known who was going to get a majority of votes.
 

I ran in this election for Public Affairs representative and I know perfectly well how the rules work I even got an electoral offence.
 

Many Demand Better supporters feel that the hole in the wall outside the elections office shouldn’t be included. So, let’s theoretically take it out. That still leaves the other violations, all of which have been proven true. Since Bruce is a fourth-year law student, he should understand that even this would have a jury uphold the disqualification.
 

Other offences listed in last week’s article should be upheld for the simple reason that many other people independent witnessed them.
 

The first electoral offence relates to the Facebook ad that lead back to a group for Nick Bergamini and is a electoral offence because it not only attacks one side, but it advocates for another.
 

Campaigning on DC++ during the election period is an offence because the administrators are known supporters of Demand Better. When I tried to advocate my position on DC ++, the administrators banned me for 10 years because “I don’t agree with them.”
 

It is also false to say that Erik Halliwell and Meera Chander openly campaigned for CUSA during the finale of Res Idol because they didn’t. They were there because of their positions and they were introduced in the same way.
 

To go ahead and relate people on the electoral board to their affiliations in the Greek community and social circles is something that if you are going to do, do it right. Alex Sirois is not president of Greek Council; he is president of Greek social council. Carlos Chacon is only a past president.
 

To say that this person is a friend with that person is something that cannot be taken into account because when someone is on CUSA for a couple of years, they develop friendships.
 

Friendships do not mean that they share political views and affiliations. Mike Wiseman and Chelsea Dunn potentially vote with certain people all the time only proves that they share the same views for the future of CUSA and Carleton. Wiseman works hard for CUSA, and gets paid for his work; and he does not get paid that much.
 

The author of last week’s article knows the mistakes and the miscommunications that were made in his article because when he posted it on Facebook, a number of the mistakes were fixed. The constitutional board has no true slant because Brittany Smyth has already stated that she will not be on the board. So have others who are politically responsible enough to do the right thing.
 

The election was conducted in a fair and honest manner. Therefore, Erik is My President.

Pavan Sapra
First-year political science and law