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Following re-tabulation of votes, Justin Monaco-Barnes remains president-elect of the McMaster Students Union
February 5, 2016 at 21:20 pm
On Friday, February 5, the Elections Committee met to hear the appeal of MSU presidential candidate Sarah Jama. Ms. Jama was disqualified on election night following the decision of the Elections Committee that Ms. Jama was found in violation of numerous election rules, warranting a disqualification as per Bylaw 10 – Elections.
Based on the evidence presented at the appeal, the Elections Committee has re-instated Ms. Jama. Upon re-tabulation of votes, Justin Monaco-Barnes remains president-elect of the MSU.
2016 MSU Presidential election results:
The Elections Committee has reduced Sarah’s fine in regards to the violation of rule 6.1 Spending Limit, which was in relation to the fact that the fees associated with her campaign website were not properly documented. Though a fine for the violation remains, the Elections Committee lowered the value after hearing Sarah’s arguments. In addition, the Elections Committee has upheld its decision to fine Ms. Jama for a violation of rule 2.1 - Bad taste for comments stemming from her campaign Twitter account. That said, the Elections Committee has ruled that those comments, soon after removed by Ms. Jama, who also excused members of her campaign team over the error, did not significantly affect the integrity of the election.
Immediately following the Election Committee’s decision to re-instate Ms. Jama, each campaign was contacted by the Chief Returning Officer and was offered the opportunity to witness the re-tabulation of the results. Those results re-affirm that Justin Monaco-Barnes is president-elect of the MSU.
To view the original information from election night, including the results of the referendum, please click here.
Minutes from the Election Committee meeting held on election night outlining the original grounds for Ms. Jama’s disqualification, have been ratified by the Elections Committee and are available here.
Minutes from the appeals meeting held on Friday, February 5, 2016, at which Ms. Jama was reinstated and Justin Monaco-Barnes was re-affimred as MSU president-elect will be available in the near future, as they must first be ratified by the Elections Committee.
For more information, please contact:
Priya Gupta
Chief Returning Officer
elections@msu.mcmaster.ca
905-525-9140 ext. 24118
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