“No one’s running for President” and other uncontested roles: A look at student election season so far
Election season for the students’ associations is well underway, filled with uncontested roles and missing positions. ASA has only received two candidates, who are gunning for three positions between the two of them. Currently, ASA has five board seats, consisting of a President, Vice-President, Cultural Officer, Welfare Officer and Education Officer. In this election, no one is running for the position of President or Education Officer, leaving some students “worried” and “sceptical” at how smoothly things will look next year.
“President is like a big position, right? I’m just not sure why ASA hasn’t delayed the elections more until they found a candidate, or encouraged anyone from their current exec to run again,” one student told Massive. The role of ASA President is 30 hours per week, with an annual honorarium of up to $26,500, and is “responsible for the overall leadership” of the association, as well as engagement with external bodies such as the University and other student associations. Quite simply, they’re fucking important.
ASA President Ben Austin says he’s “not disappointed at all” at the lack of candidates, saying, “We understand that [Covid-19] has thrown a huge spanner in the works and respect students’ decisions. I would have preferred to have more candidates to fill a few more roles though.”
“[Covid-19] has been tough on everyone as well as student associations around the country.” He adds that ASA would normally do a lot more on-campus advertising, but due to lockdown they switched to more online promotion “as well as promotion in Massive Magazine” (lol).
Under ASA’s constitution, a candidate can only hold one position. So, with Angelo Fray running uncontested for Cultural Officer, and Marizaan Zwart running uncontested for Vice-President, it looks likely that the position of Welfare Officer, that both candidates are also running for, will remain unfilled. If a candidate has been nominated for multiple roles and wins a majority vote for more than one role, the candidate may select their preferred role within 24 hours of the final voting results.
ASA has promised a by-election next year in March to fill the empty roles, but that still leaves a large space of time from when the current exec departs their roles, typically at the end of the year.
“It feels messy, as an outsider,” one student says. “Like I’m sure they tried their best, but still, it’s far from ideal. There’s going to be a lot of work over summer that I’m not sure can be left to just two people, especially if they’re new to the role.” However, Ben promises that ASA has some plans in place “to ensure that there is the required continuity” which will be announced at the SGM later this month.
In Wellington, MAWSA has closed nominations for their executive, with voting soon to take place. All the roles have at least one candidate running, but only one position is contested between two candidates for students to vote for. As one student says, “They all seem like cool people, but there’s not really much choice, it doesn’t feel like much of an election.”
Tessa Guest, President of MAWSA, admits that options were restricted due to lockdown but “we worked really hard to engage with students in this time”.
Tessa says she’s “absolutely” disappointed at the lack of contested roles. “Our student executive is democratically elected, and that process is dampened when roles aren’t contested.” However, she believes that this outcome is “just a reflection of the current time we’re in. It’s incredibly difficult and scary to commit to an opportunity like this when you’re stuck in lockdown, and probably don’t even want to think ahead of the next day. I really empathise with students in this.” The country went into lockdown shortly after nominations opened, so MAWSA opted to do social media advertising for the roles, including Instagram livestreams and ‘a day in the life’ of different executive members.
Despite the lack of nominations, Tessa says she’s “relieved and really excited” for the candidates they’ve received, who she describes as “capable, passionate and enthusiastic”.
“I have no doubt that we’ll end up with a strong 2022 exec at the end of this. I’m also glad to see no unfilled roles. Next year will start strong with a full team, and they’ll be a force to be reckoned with.”
As for the Distance and Manawatū executives, only time will tell how their nomination processes will go. M@D have just announced their AGM, scheduled for October 11, where they’ll ask for expressions of interest in nominations. “Our elections will occur 2 weeks after that,” they told Massive.
The positions up for elections in M@D’s two-year cycle are Vice-President, a Māori seat, and a new Pasifika seat. Other positions, such as M@D’s Co-Presidents, will retain their seats for a second year. “We are looking at bringing in rainbow, Pasifika, and disability voice[s] but are unsure on when these will be brought in through the election rotation, and if we opt in the rest on a one-year term instead of M@D’s typical [two-year] term, or, consider creating portfolios for some areas and positions for others,” the Co-Presidents say.
For MUSA elections, nominations opened last week at their AGM, and will close on September 21. The campaigning period will run from Wednesday 22 September until Tuesday 12 October, with voting taking place between 13-15 October.