Two attempts to circumvent the voting guidelines in the recent Board of Governors elections have not affected election results and another election will not be held, the secretary of the board and deputy university secretary Anne Bauer told candidates via email March 17.

In the email, Bauer identified Alexander Golovko and George Parry as the two successful undergraduate nominees based on the March 14-16 online election results. Fellow candidate Sagal Osman trailed Parry by two votes, she said.

“Two attempts were made to circumvent the voting guidelines,” Bauer said. “These improper attempts were intercepted by the system and did not result in effective votes cast.”

In a March 18 letter, Parry and Osman responded by saying, “since it is obvious that the election has been compromised, we are asking that a paper ballot election be held as soon as possible to determine who the 2011-2012 undergraduate representatives will be.”

Golovko said he finds the allegations disrespectful.

“All those allegations . . . are first of all a disrespectful accusation to the administration, second of all a direct insult to me, and finally an insult to my electorate at large because this is a direct insult to all the students who voted for me and want to see me there,” he said.

Parry and Osman could not be reached for comment.

In a second letter sent March 21, Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA) vice-president (student life) and current undergraduate representative Christopher Infantry and fellow representative Cameron Mckenzie criticized online elections.

“It is the position of [CUSA] that online elections are not a practical way to conduct elections at Carleton,” they wrote.

Bauer said this is the first year the university has decided to use online voting for the board elections.

“The voting system requires that voters provide a student identification number in order to vote. When two individuals tried to use the same student identification number twice to vote, the system detected the irregularity. This allowed the isolation of the votes cast by those student numbers. Those votes were not counted,” said a statement released by the university March 23.

The director of Carleton’s computing and security services has been on sick leave since March 21, but Bauer said she hopes to meet with him March 23 in order to provide the scrutineers with further election result details.

Infantry and Mckenzie both said they want the university to return to using paper ballots. However, Bauer said the online ballots increased voter turnout.

“It was very successful, the voter turnout rate was over double from last year from the paper ballets. We will be using online voting methods in the years to come,” she said.

“The university took the necessary steps to ensure a fair and transparent election process. This isn't the Rideau River Residence Association, you can’t just call a new election when you don't like the result,” said unsuccessful candidate Evan Hamilton.

“The election results were not compromised so we are not running another election. That is final,” Bauer confirmed.