VUWSA President’s Job on Line

VUWSA President’s Job on Line

Michael Oliver

VUWSA President Jasmine Freemantle anticipates her record of achievement at the association this year will see her ride clear a motion of no confidence at this Wednesday’s Special General Meeting (SGM).

Both Freemantle and Education Officer (Welfare) Robert Latimer run the risk of being dismissed should motions of no confidence be passed against them.

A quorum of 100 students needs to be present at the SGM for the votes to take place. Of that 100, two-thirds voting need to be in favour of the motions for them to pass.

Speaking on the VBC last month, Freemantle highlighted a list of her achievements since taking office in January. Among those includes formulating VUWSA’s first strategic and operating plan in a number of years, introducing executive work reports and coordinating the hiring of the new association manager.

Freemantle was assured that her “large support base” would rally behind her and ensure she sees through the remainder of her term.

Support for Education Officer Welfare Robert Latimer does not appear to be as forthcoming, with a number of students from Victoria’s Pipitea campus voicing displeasure with the exec member’s efforts.

An examination of Latimer’s work reports posted on VUWSA’s website detail examinations of tasks either uncompleted or delayed.

Of particular note were the significant delays surrounding Latimer’s completion of the VUWSA Food Bank Database, which was lost along with his laptop during a trip to Nelson in April.

The VUWSA Exec apologised on behalf of Latimer for the database loss, which contained the names and details of those students who had used the Food Bank Service.

Latimer refused to take responsibility for losing the database, saying he could not be held responsible for having his belongings stolen.

The Food Bank Database appears to have been a continued point of contention between Latimer and the VUWSA Exec, stretching back to the beginning of the year.

Details released to Salient reveal that Latimer had been in correspondence with members the VUWSA Exec as early as January about the progress of the database.

Latimer had been prompted via repeated emails and in a number of exec meetings about its completion, a task which had been repeatedly delayed.

In an email correspondence with VUWSA Vice-President of Welfare Seamus Brady, Brady asked Latimer about whether or not the database would be completed by the end of February “at the latest”.

“I just don’t want to get too far in to the year without entering information, because we all know what happens with that,” Brady wrote.

Questions regarding Latimer’s ability to complete the task rose to the fore earlier in the year when he admitted to Brady knowing little about using spreadsheets, which had been the basis of the database’s construction.

Despite Brady volunteering to recruit assistance, Latimer rebuffed all help.

Latimer’s performance as a member has been called into question on a number of other fronts.

President Jasmine Freemantle spoke candidly about having to assist Latimer on numerous occasions with his position, noting that his only significant achievement was volunteering to pick up bread for VUWSA’s Food Bank every Wednesday.

Latimer, who ironically voted against the two petitions of no confidence against himself and Freemantle, despite being the facilitator of the motion against the President, told the VBC that this Wednesday’s vote was “too soon” for students for form an opinion.

This Wednesday’s vote comes hard on the heels of a flurry of resignations from five members of the 2009 exec.

Should both motions of no confidence be passed, only five members of the Exec will remain, one short of the necessary quorum of six needed to hold official meetings. The exec would be unable to pass any motions until after the by-election in late July.

This Wednesday’s SGM will be held at 1pm at Mount Street Bar in the Student Union Building.

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This story was syndicated by the Aotearoa Student Press Association via Salient www.salient.org.nz

ENDS

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