Student governments at Carleton University have a history of election controversy—spanning from disqualifications to lawsuits. While the Rideau River Residence Association (RRRA) recently investigated allegations of electoral code violations in its 2020 election, the issues that plague the campaigns of Carleton’s student governments span decades.
“It is super important for the student groups to get their election affairs in order, ASAP,” Stéphanie Plante, an elections expert and incoming director of Carleton’s centre for security, intelligence and defence studies, said. “The minute people lose confidence in the election process, they’re going to lose legitimacy.”
Looking back at the Charlatan’s online coverage of student governments dating back to 2009, here’s a snapshot of each government’s electoral history.
Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA)
In the 2020 executive elections, students who opted out of the association’s fees as part of the Student Choice Initiative (SCI) were initially barred from voting. Six hours before the polls closed, CUSA retracted the rule and extended voting by an additional two hours.
When four of six executive positions were uncontested in the 2018 elections, no confidence led voting for three of the six positions up for grabs, leading to a byelection to fill the vacant seats.
After winning his byelection, vice-president (student life) Abdullah Jaber posted a video ridiculing another candidate. Jaber was suspended for two weeks and faced an unsuccessful impeachment vote in council.
Current vice-president (student life) Osman Elmi also faced criticism in this year’s election after posting a video in which he states, “We won six for six—fuck the rest,” following his slate’s sweep of the election.
In 2016, a months-long saga was ultimately decided by the Ontario Superior Court of Justice. Vice-president (student services) candidate Ashley Courchene won the election, but was later disqualified. The constitutional board reversed the disqualification upon appeal, only to flip again and rule opposing candidate Frena Hailekiros the victor.
Then-CUSA president Fahd Alhattab, a member of Hailekiros’ slate, faced a removal vote in council and calls to resign. Courchene pursued legal action and was reinstated by order of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice.
In 2010, 29 councillor candidates were disqualified for presenting fake receipts in their campaign expense report.
Plante, who worked at Elections Canada for 10 years and on elections in Switzerland, the Middle East and eastern Europe, said that the controversies of Carleton’s elections do not surprise her as they are not uncommon in politics.
Carleton Academic Student Government (CASG)
This past year, the CASG council moved to appoint vice president (internal) Tyler Boswell as CEO for the election. Boswell said the step was taken to save money, time and resources, but councillors brought up concerns about transparency and the role of council.
In 2010, vice president (finance and administration) Brandon Wallingford was terminated for violating 13 sections of his contract, including charges of consuming and storing alcohol in his office. At the same time, Wallingford ran for CASG president.
Rideau River Residence Association (RRRA)
In 2017, the Fresh RRRA slate was disqualified for three electoral violations, including a recording that showed a Fresh RRRA candidate offered a member of another slate a job if the slate dropped out and supported Fresh RRRA.
The disqualification came too close to the election to remove Fresh RRRA from the ballot, and the slate won the most votes. After appeal, council voted for the university ombudsperson to review the election.
While the ombudsperson said that another election should be held, the RRRA executive—including president Hyder Naqvi, who ran for re-election after Fresh RRRA’s disqualification—accepted the results of the first election.
In 2016, The Home Team slate was disqualified for six electoral violations, including the use of off-campus volunteer and then-CUSA president Alhattab. The Forward slate faced a similar allegation in this year’s election.
The 2013 election proved to be a rollercoaster of disqualifications. The Rez-Solutions slate was disqualified less than five hours before voting stations opened, but was later reinstated and the constitutional board called for another election.
In the second election, Rez-Solutions—this time called A New RRRA—won, only to be disqualified again.
In 2012, the Home Team presidential candidate was in possession of a residence binder containing confidential information on all residence students. Jaden Slawter of the Forward slate faced similar allegations this year.
The chief electoral officer (CEO) gave the slate an option: resign and keep the theft of the binder confidential or stay in the race and have it investigated. The slate remained in the race, and their opposition—Keep RRRA Working—was declared the victor in a previously-tied election.
In 2011, after A Better Rez received a violation for taking an unsealed ballot box and voter list into the counting room, the CUSA president-elect accosted the CEO about the violation, giving the slate a second violation for harassment. The slate was initially disqualified, then reinstated by the constitutional board, forcing a second election. A Better Rez won.
Anna Esselment, a University of Waterloo associate professor of political science, said that the rules that govern any election are developed to ensure fairness.
“Disqualifications are not necessarily because the [electoral] code is too strict, although that can be a possibility,” Esselment wrote in an email. “If it’s the feeling of student candidates that they are too restricted [by the electoral code], then perhaps a process for reviewing the election . . . is valuable.”
Plante believes the first step to renewing student trust in elections would be to outsource the administration of elections by hiring a consultant.
In the most recent RRRA election, chief electoral officer Qusai Yusuf sat as council chair while former vice president (programming), Slawter, was a presidential candidate. Yusuf denied any conflict of interest.
In 2018, CUSA executives came under fire when all six executives served as campaign managers for all of the One Carleton slate candidates.
“There needs to be a rewriting of the election code,” Plante said. “They need to bring in some sort of third party … This can’t be an inside job anymore because they’re going to lose legitimacy.”
Graduate Students’ Association (GSA)
While the GSA has largely avoided the controversies that have plagued other campus bodies, it has suffered from a lack of student involvement.
Candidates in GSA elections have run unopposed six times in the last nine years; only one executive position has been contested since 2015. At the same time, only 6.2 per cent of eligible students voted in 2018, and 5.5 per cent in 2019.
When it comes to voter turnout, Plante said that the closer an election is to home — for example, a school board election — the lower the turnout typically is. Students also generally vote less in provincial and federal elections.
“If 95% of eligible students aren’t voting, it means that a very small number of students get to determine who holds power to make decisions that affect them,” Esselment said. “Students must simply recognize that not participating [in an election] means handing a lot of control over to the very few.”
The focus, Plante said, should be on increasing accessibility to elections by moving voting online and increasing the duration of the voting period.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Plante encouraged student governments to re-evaluate the way elections are held.
“Everyone should take a breath, relax, and they should look at some of the options for revamping their elections,” Plante said. “That should be priority number one.”
Featured image provided by Element 5 via Unsplash.
