After the election of four new student representatives to the Union Board last week, it appears more changes are likely with the revelation that Board member elect and current ANUSA President Dallas Proctor is planning to study abroad in Semester 1, 2013.
Dallas Proctor of Back To The Future was elected behind Jack Gracie of Fresh and Aizaz Syed of Grow Your Union, with the crucial post-graduate position won by Olivia Kelly of Grow Your Union by a considerable margin. The elections saw a total of 1147 votes submitted by ANU students over four days.
However, it appears Dallas Proctor may only serve four months of his two year term which begins in September after receiving an offer from the ANU to study abroad on exchange. Mr Proctor failed to disclose this to voters despite receiving his offer well before Union elections took place.
Mr Proctor disagreed when asked by Woroni whether this was disrespectful to students who had elected him in good faith that he would complete his full term. “I think a 4-5 month deadline serves as excellent motivation for getting things done fast,” he said.
If he resigns, the appointment of his replacement will be at the discretion of the highly factionalised Board. Whilst this appointment may not necessarily reflect the platform Mr Proctor ran on, he told Woroni he believed: “I have a mandate on the back of the Back to the Future brand – a mandate that can (and should) be transferred to another Back To The Future candidate down the track.”
It is understood his running mate Tom Barrington-Smith would be next in line though the Board is under no constitutional obligations to follow Mr Proctor’s “mandate”.
Present Chair of the Union Board, Michael Hiscox, told Woroni: “Dallas is a respected member of our campus community and I’m sure that the Board would take into consideration his recommendation on who should take his place.”
It is likely that current Board member and former Grow Your Union candidate Xinyu Ru will become the next Chair of the Union Board with the election of two candidates from his ticket in these elections.
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