The elections office for the Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA) cancelled the ranked voting system brought forward by council due to the limited number of candidates running.
“The idea for this election was that only constituencies with one seat on council [were] going to get the ranked voting ballot . . . those constituencies were computer science, humanities, journalism, and PAPM,” said Matthew Swain, the chief electoral officer of Elections CUSA.
The ranked voting system was meant to answer who is the first choice to be elected as well as the next preferred candidate.
Swain said it was meant to show the true majority of preference within those specific constituencies as a trial run to see if it was a reasonable option for the future. Despite CUSA council passing a motion to bring ranked voting, the process has since been cancelled.
“Unfortunately, those constituencies only had two nominees,” he said. “Therefore ranked voting is kind of irrelevant.”
Voting will occur on Jan. 27 and 28, with ballots available online as well as polling stations around campus. All polls will close at 10 p.m. on the 28 with results available as early as 11:30 p.m.
