Hussen still expected to win BOG race, at least four senate races are up in the air
The University of Ottawa’s administration will email 615 ballots to undergraduate students who previously did not receive a ballot to vote in the BOG undergraduate student representative election and partial U of O Senate elections that took place on June 2 to 4.
According to four of the candidates running for the seat on the BOG, the details were first laid out in a video call that took place on Friday with Catherine Schweizer from the office of the BOG’s Secretary-General, before being confirmed in an email a day later by Schweizer.
“Due to a technical issue encountered when generating the list of eligible voters (registered full time students in the winter 2020 and/or spring/summer 2020 terms) for the Senate and the Board, 615 voters were inadvertently left out and did not receive a ballot,” stated Schweizer in an email to candidates on Saturday. “The 615 students will be informed by email on Monday, June 15th and all undergraduate students who previously received a ballot will be informed of the reopening of the election.”
Students who previously received a ballot in the June 2 to 4 elections will not be receiving a second ballot.
The Fulcrum previously reported that a number of students had not received any communication from the university regarding the election. This included no reception of an online ballot, resulting in an inability to vote. Conversely, a number of ineligible students (graduates, for example) had reported having received ballots to vote.
Candidates from the BOG and Senate races can resume campaigning on Monday at 10:00 a.m. They will be allowed to campaign until Tuesday at 11:59 p.m. Students who are eligible to vote will be informed on Monday and will receive their ballot on Wednesday morning. The 615 students will have until Thursday at 11:59 p.m to cast their votes.
As of Sunday, if the preliminary unofficial results of the BOG student representative election are to be trusted, incumbent Saada Hussen led Showmia Chandru by 504 votes. Chandru had 243 votes while Hussen had 747 votes. If the 6,3 per cent turnout and votes of the June 2 to 4 election are to be trusted, Hussen should be easily re-elected to her seat on the BOG.
In the University of Ottawa’s Senate partial elections,four of the individual faculty races were decided by less than 20 votes.
The closest race, according to the preliminary unofficial results, was the Faculty of Sciences race where Anjaliya Sonnilal beat Maya Elkbouli by only two votes. According to Schweizer, 27 students from the Faculty of Sciences will receive a ballot to vote, easily tipping into Elkbouli’s favour.
The same could be said of Daniel Chow who, in the preliminary unofficial results, trailed Sabrina Chang by only four votes in the Faculty of Law race. It will be a hard task for Chow, however, who will need the votes of at least five of the nine eligible voters.
The third race to keep an eye on is for the Faculty of Medicine where Bryce Bogie edged out Carlie Boisvert, the former BOG undergraduate student representative, by only 16 votes in the preliminary unofficial results. There will be 124 medical students receiving ballots to vote in this race. According to the preliminary results, Bogie has received only 116 votes and is in the lead. Both Carlie Boisvert and Adam Bailey, who had 98 and 65 votes respectively, could overtake Bogie.
Finally, with over 346 students set to vote in the Faculty of Health Sciences race, Jameel Kara’s 18 vote lead over Sarah Aly could melt very quickly.
If you are one of the 615 electors that will be voting this week in the partial senate elections and wish to inform yourself more on who to vote this week, the Fulcrum’s Zoë Mason wrote an article detailing each candidate running for a senate seat.
