The original winning slate in the 2017 Rideau River Residence Association (RRRA) election that was disqualified due to electoral violations has decided to stop pursuing legal action against the association.
Fresh RRRA’s three candidates—presidential candidate Nayla Al-Ajami, vice-president (programming) candidate Anthony Hajji and vice-president (administration) candidate Connor Thibodeau—expressed their intent to take legal action after the decision to hold another election was nullified by Patrick Watson, RRRA’s executive director.
In an Aug. 15 Facebook post, Al-Ajami announced the decision to not pursue legal action, thanking the slate’s supporters and volunteers while vowing to “never forget the 50 votes we won by.”
According to Al-Ajami, her slate decided to stop legal action because a lawsuit would be too expensive.
“The cost of the lawsuit would exceed $20,000, and the trial date would be in late August,” she said in a phone interview. “I would love to continue the lawsuit, but we’re students. We don’t have that kind of money, and it would take too much time. If we lost, we would have to pay the legal fees of the defense. Even if there is a one per cent chance we lose, it’s too risky.”
According to Jim Kennelly, Carleton’s ombudsperson, Fresh RRRA was disqualified from the election after three violations: a volunteer not wearing a badge while campaigning, a volunteer campaigning outside of a campaign zone, and a slate member allegedly bribing another slate to drop out of the election.
The election results, in which The Next Step slate was determined the winner despite coming in second place after Fresh RRRA won by 50 votes, were declared legitimate by deputy electoral officer Zackary Meier.
“What I’ve learned from this is that politics is very dirty,” Al-Ajami said.
In a report delivered to RRRA council on April 1, Kennelly argued that holding a new vote was the “fairest” choice.
“The residence students could then decide, ‘okay, do we want to go with the guys that are number two [The Next Step] or do we still trust the ones that broke some rules [Fresh RRRA]?’” Kennelly explained.
“The executive members felt that it should haven’t been accepted by the chair—instead, there should have been a motion. So then they set up two council meetings, and oddly enough, quorum could not be found. Then after that, the executive director ruled that the very first decision [of disqualification for Fresh RRRA] should stand,” he added.
In an April 17 Facebook post, Al-Ajami alleged that “the unelected Executive Director of RRRA, Patrick Watson, colluded with Hyder Naqvi and other members of staff to make sure this never happened.”
“RRRA is biased and unprofessional in my opinion,” Al-Ajami said.
In her Facebook post, Al-Ajami said there have been six disqualifications throughout the past six RRRA elections.
Kennelly said previous Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA) litigations made RRRA hesitant to take the dispute to court.
“I doubt very much of it would stand the test of stopping the people who actually won the election,” he said. “The rule breaks themselves are relatively minor; one of which was not campaigning in the correct campaign mark, and I doubt that’s enough reason to say to the people, ‘your votes don’t count, number two [The Next Step] should win’.”
Hyder Naqvi, the incumbent RRRA president and presidential candidate of The Next Step, said in a Facebook message that RRRA “followed the wishes of council and the rules of the association” when it voted to legitimize the election results.
Naqvi added that he didn’t think the election drama would have any effect on RRRA this year.
Al-Ajami said if she had been elected to RRRA, she would only serve one term and “make any committees as unbiased as they could be.”
“I would make sure the constitution would follow what it is actually supposed to do,” she said. “Unfortunately, I think the RRRA will stay pretty much the same for next year’s election.”
Photo by Trevor Swann
