This is when democracy dies...

I just finished reading an article titled A week in hell and I felt very bad for the students who went through what they went through.

What perks my attention - nay angers me is the motion that had been passed and how it was passed.

Motion 6

It proposed that the minimum percentage of student signatures required to initiate a referendum to leave the CFS be raised from 10 per cent to 20 per cent. Referendums would also be limited to once every five years and only four referendums in total could take place per year.

Here is a little bit of background. This is all from my own meandering experience. Last year when the YFS elections came around we had people here from all different universities in Ontario campaigning for the slate that was CFS friendly. We had people at our school, with no affiliation to York trying to get votes for a government's election that they had no stake in.

So there was a referendum put out that would make it so that this wouldn't happen, we would have many schools have a vote on whether to keep the CFS as their student government at the same time. This allows students at our school to make an informed choice with people on either side of the issue being from York.

So they counter this by enforcing a new policy that only four referendums could take place per year.

This is where democracy ends.

Referendums would also be limited to once every five years

This means that if we had a referendum this year, that someone coming into school next year would NEVER have a chance to say NO!

This is where democracy ends.

Despite receiving only 44 votes—two per cent shy of the 66 per cent required for approval—the motion passed. The chair ruled that the six abstentions did not count as voting members, despite a voting member being defined by the CFS' own bylaws as a delegation present in the room.

For those 6 delegates and the universities they represent, this is called being silenced. Your representatives who you (I assume) democratically voted in are being told that they do not count.

This is where democracy ends.

This is not just a story, this is a call to action. If you are as angered by this as I am, then show it.

E-mail the President of the YFS and tell him how you feel: Krisna Saravanamuttu - president@yfs.ca
E-mail the Vice-President Students of York and tell him you are tired of the lack of democracy shown in the CFS: Rob Tiffin - vpstdnts@yorku.ca