Fletcher gets a second term as existing sabbaticals all re-elected
CUSU President Mark Fletcher has been awarded a second term in office, in a vote which saw all four of the 07/08 sabbatical officers who stood for a second year re-elected. Turnout, which has fallen in the past two years, grew to 3,396, 17.1% of the electorate. When Varsity went to press the exact results of the presidential vote were still not known, but Fletcher is understood to have won a majority of first-choice votes.
Though 34.8% of those voting in the elections spoilt their papers in the constitutional referendum, the new CUSU constitution was passed by a majority of 91.2% of valid votes. CUSU remains affiliated to NUS and UKCISA.
Fletcher told Varsity, “I’m obviously delighted with the win, and at the fact so many of the team will still be together this year. The progress we have made this year won’t be wasted, and this gives us a real opportunity to build our Student Union. These elections offered people the chance to see CUSU lurch wildly to the left or the right of the political spectrum, and it is now clear that
this isn’t where the students want CUSU to be.”
Fletcher saw off competition from Higher Education Funding Officer and left-leaning campaigner Richard Braude and libertarian conservative Hugo Hadlow, who planned to strip back CUSU’s functions and funding.
After the election Braude, who has argued that CUSU needs to be political to be relevant, told Varsity, “For a long time CUSU has been failing, but there are elements within it which are attempting to ensure its survival and relevance. I have every faith in some of the newly elected officers, and that those who desire to merely maintain the status quo will look to them for the vision, strength and hope which our student body needs.”
The fourth candidate, Basit Kirmani, pulled out of the race on Wednesday after complaints about an message he sent to the Queens’ JCR email list which told students, “At the moment it is a three horse race between a guy from King’s, the
ex-president from Jesus and me. Both of those colleges traditionally have a much better turnout at voting but all of that MUST change this year if I am to win!” He requests, “PLEASE PLEASE DO VOTE FOR ME! It will take 1 minute max! and spread the word...I really need all of your support!”
The first page of CUSU’s Election Rules 2008 states that “Candidates are not to advertise the election, or their candidacy by e-mail sent to a person who is not known to the candidate as a friend or on any forwarding email list”.
In a letter to the Election Committee, Kirmani described the email as “an honest mistake”, and said that “in the best interests of CUSU Elections 2007/08, all the other candidates running in this election, my supporters and the twenty-thousand strong student population in Cambridge that CUSU represents, I feel that the most honourable thing to do in my position is to resign. I also speak as a representative of my religion (Islam) and my ethnicity (British-Asian).”