The Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA) elections office announced on Instagram it would not be releasing results of the presidential election until April 1. The decision belies CUSA’s commitment to transparency and adds undue stress during an election period that has already been tumultuous.
During this year’s presidential debate and last year’s executives’ debate, many candidates spoke about ensuring students were informed about CUSA’s decisions and internal processes.
While the candidates were speaking about the month-to-month operations of council, it is also important for students to know how their representatives are elected and how their levy fees are spent on the electoral process.
Unofficial results reflect the number of votes each candidate gets. Even if the official results differ, students deserve to know why. Unofficial results offer students important context.
Transparency was a universal campaign point—it is important to both students and council. Refusing to release unofficial electoral results as CUSA has previously done every year is not transparency.
Plus, the delayed announcement is unfair to council.
According to CUSA’s new structure, council needs to appoint new executives. The current vice-presidents’ terms end April 30 and the new president enters office May 1. That will be less than a month after the official results are released.
That leaves the president only one month to prepare to lead a brand new CUSA and executives even less time to learn how to operate in a new structure. Executives could have even less time to learn if their appointments are delayed, which is not unlikely given this year’s presidential by-election and presidential election were both postponed this year.
From the beginning of the nominations process to the final official results, the presidential election process dragged on longer than a month. That was without the added burden of final projects and exams. Nothing suggests appointing five executives will happen any faster.
CUSA is already straining—pulled apart by structural overhauls, electoral conflicts and cyberbullies. With 10 days of tension from when voting closes to when official results are released, CUSA’s governmental systems are at their breaking point. Transparency in electoral results is a small step CUSA can take to fix accountability issues that have plagued the organization for decades.
Featured graphic from file.
