The Martlet

I’m one of many international students who love this welcoming and beautiful university.

I was born and raised in Mexico and have only been in Canada for three years. My family encouraged my choice to come here because Canada’s educational, political and economic systems are admired by the rest of the world.

I feel privileged to be here and I’m making the most of unexpected opportunities to learn first-hand about labour relations in Canada and about Canadian student politics. Workers and employers seem to engage in the same struggle the world over. However, Canadian student politics is like nothing I’ve ever seen.

Although I love my country, in Mexico there is frequent misuse of authority at many levels. We recognize this problem and often question authority. We speak out, we criticize and often a lot of wrongs get righted.

The first step to correct any problem is to recognize that it exists. I see a problem in the UVSS. In Mexico, we would recognize it as misuse of authority. At UVic, there seems to be great reluctance to recognize that anything truly bad could happen here.

Last Thursday the Students’ Society held its AGM. Was it open, honest and democratic? I don’t think so. The location wasn’t announced until the last minute, and for a society with 16,000 members the board booked a room with 156 seats.

In the middle of a total breakdown in all operations of the Society, no faculty or university administrators were there to observe or advise. Graduate students willing and able to offer assistance were not allowed in the room.

Non-student employees of the society who might have contributed their perspectives were excluded. It was well-known that a procedural question about a special resolution to remove directors would arise. Nobody with independent expert knowledge was present to address it.

I had read the bylaws carefully, sought an expert opinion and diligently followed the simple procedure that allows students to vote to remove their current directors at an Annual General Meeting should they wish to do so.

I collected four times the requisite number of signatures to place a special resolution, and the Martlet published the requisite two weeks notice of a vote for the removal of directors to take place at the AGM.

The chair and board are probably doing their best, and I think most students realize that.

Still, with an increasingly bitter strike, a chair who crosses the picket line every morning and a growing mountain of garbage behind the SUB, it is not surprising that hundreds of students want to at least be allowed to consider a change in leadership.

The option to vote to remove directors at general meetings is a safety catch so members can intervene when the wheels come off a non-profit society and a change of leadership is needed between elections.

Two weeks ago, UVSS chair Caitlin Meggs wrote in this space that there would be no opportunity to remove her at the AGM because, in her opinion, I had not followed the bylaws correctly. She was wrong.

Ms. Meggs left out Bylaw 10.4 (a) entirely and inserted the word “only” into Bylaw 10. 4 (b).

I used the process that is appropriate when a general meeting is already scheduled and the goal is to add the item to the proceedings.

Now that the AGM is over, another process is needed. A special general meeting would have to be called, just to vote on whether to remove the directors.

The chair of the AGM was Amanada Aziz from the Canadian Federation of Students. Would she want the UVSS board removed? I don’t think so.

With no independent advisers present, and without the bylaws in front of them, she invited students to vote on whether to accept me, José Barrios, or her, as an authority on the bylaws. Amanda Aziz told students that it would be incorrect to allow a vote on the resolution to remove our directors, and a majority of the students voted to respect the rules as interpreted for them by the chair.

Aziz radiated competence and openness. I would have believed her myself if I didn’t know our bylaws inside out and backwards. Still, she also left out Bylaw 10.4 (a) and she was just as wrong, in just the same way, as Caitlin Meggs.

What can be done?

I will canvass students again, to see if five per cent of undergraduates want to hold a special general meeting and vote on whether to remove the board.

It would be best if many more than 165 students come out to vote, to ensure a substantial mandate one way or the other.

A room that can accommodate at least 500 should be reserved and the meeting should be open to the public.

The university community must be allowed to contribute to our discussion and decision making. A chair with no ties of any kind to the board is essential. The meeting must be open and completely transparent.

Anything less is unworthy of this campus and this country.