Let the rains begin — day 4, UMSU elections 2016
The weather held out to, and in fact as we write this, long past, the close of polling. Oh well, the Bureau gives us a 95% chance of rain tomorrow. There’s also relatively little to report on the rumours and behaviour front, although today saw the first ticket ban (discussed below)
Turnout
| Polling place | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Running total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Union House | 252 | 249 | 226 | 233 | 960 |
| Baillieu Library | 330 | 400 | 284 | 297 | 1311 |
| FBE Building | 82 | 95 | 67 | 63 | 307 |
| Burnley | — | 15 | 8 | — | 23 |
| VCA | — | 37 | 34 | 52 | 123 |
| Total | 664 | 796 | 619 | 645 | 2,719 |
The wrap
The weather was good again, although we were pretty strategic about avoiding the sun today and your intrepid reporters are much less sunburnt.
We spotted campaigners today from Stand Up!, More!, Left Focus, Create, Independent Media, Activate. We imagine the Whigs must have been around too, or they wouldn’t have got banned.
A few people have asked us why More! candidate for MUSUL Board (and current Media Officer/Farrago editor, elected last year on the Independent Media ticket) Caleb Triscari is publicly advocating people preference Independent Media above the line, rather than More! (Independent Media didn’t preference More!, or in fact anyone, for their above the line Students’ Council votes).
We considered guessing the answer, but decided to ask him instead, to which he responded that “[o]bviously I can’t run for MUSUL board with Indie Media which is why I’m with More. Regardless of how the result turns out for me, I still put Indie Media first and foremost which is why I publicly support them for Council”.
We asked More! if they thought Caleb was just using the ticket, to which we were told “Caleb has repeatedly advocated support for More in crucial OB and committee contests, and his public support for the ticket is welcome. His place on our ticket represents our commitment to putting up the candidates we believe are best for each position”.
The day also saw the week’s first ticket ban, with all members of the Whig ticket banned from campaigning until the end of the day, allegedly due to them providing free beverages as an inducement for students to vote. The Whig ticket denies this, and is running an “internal investigation” into the incident, the outcome of which we expect to be amused to read.
And lastly, there’s another item of negative campaign material — a shitsheet, if you will — in the authorised materials file. This material is published by Left Focus authorising officer Jade Eckhaus, and makes a series of claims about More! Presidential candidate Yan Zhaung. More! described it as “negative and misleading campaigning”, which we guess we might have expected them to say.
That’s it for tonight, but be on the lookout tomorrow for how we’ll be covering the results!