By Zoë Crowther, Students' Union Correspondent and Patrick Sullivan, Film & TV Editor
The results of this year’s SU elections were announced on Friday night, with the close-fought contests revealing the power of the student vote.
Epigram reported on the announcement of the successful candidates for the seven full-time officers, the chairs of networks, Chair of Student Council, Student Trustees and Faculty Reps.
7219 students voted and 33898 votes were cast, demonstrating a 26 per cent turnout. This was only marginally higher than last year's turnout of 25 per cent.
Using a Single Tranferrable Vote system, students ranked their preferences for each role in order. Then, during the vote count, low performing candidates based on first preferences were eliminated and their votes redistributed according to voters' second and third choices. The elimination stages continued until there were just two candidates for each role remaining.
One of closest fought contests was between Julio Mkok and Beth Mulley for Union Affairs Officer, with Mkok claiming victory by 16 votes in the final stage of the count process.
Julius Ogayo also won the new position of International Students Officer by only 16 votes, ahead of Shailaja Laxman.
The small margins of victory here demonstrate the importance of the individual's voting power. Student Living Officer was also a close call, with George Bemrose beating Ruth Day by only 45 votes in the final stage.
The candidate who claimed the strongest victory was Hillary Gyebi-Ababio, winning the Undergraduate Education Officer role by 1017 votes. Her only opponent was Mehul Pasari and Gyebi-Ababio's strong campaign ensured that her victory was clear on a first preference basis alone.
The successful candidates for Sport and Student Development, Postgraduate Education and Equality, Liberation and Access Officer all won by more than 100 votes.
The winning candidates will start their roles in the summer, and will earn a £21,600 salary.
At the results night, the next Union Affairs Officer Julio Mkok said: ‘I’m speechless. If you had told me this morning I would be on the podium giving a speech, I would have said "it’s not April Fools Day!"’
Featured Image: Epigram / Hannah Worthington
