By Fabian Mayer, March 7, 2015 —

Weeks of campaigning for the 2015–16 Students’ Union election concluded when Chief Returning Officer Chris Yan announced the winners on Thursday, March 5 at the Den. A boistrous crowd packed the dance floor to hear who would represent students on next year’s Students’ Legislative Council.

Romy Garrido won the race for vice-president external with 29 per cent of the vote, besting runner-up Tristan Bray who came in an unbelievably close second with 28 per cent of the vote. Only 51 votes separated Bray from Garrido.

“I feel really shocked. I can’t believe that I won,” Garrdio said. “I’m so excited to serve our campus next year and I hope I do a great job.”

David McDonald came in third with 26 per cent of the vote, while Kyle Schole finished fourth with 17 per cent. Vice-president external was by far the closest race.

Sarah Pousette was elected vice-president operations and finance after receiving 53 per cent of the vote. Keean Bexte came in second with 38 per cent. Dan Jo received nine per cent.

“I am totally in shock right now, 53 per cent of the vote,” Pousette said. “I never anticipated that coming. I thought it was going to be a really tight race.”

Kirsty McGowan took the vice-president student life position, receiving 55 per cent of the vote. Patrick Ma came in second with 26 per cent, while Matt Ray took 18 per cent.

“I’m so glad that all my hard work has meant something. I just feel ecstatic right now,” McGowan said.

Runner-up Patrick Ma was upbeat despite losing the race.

“Kirsty McGowan definitely deserved it. She knows what she’s doing and she’s going to make a great vice-president student life,” Ma said.

Stephan Guscott was elected vice-president academic with 62 per cent of the vote. He beat his sole competitor, Sherin Mohammad, who took 38 per cent of the vote.

Guscott credited relentless campaigning for his victory.

“[I was] constantly thinking I was behind and just didn’t stop campaigning,” Guscott said.

Outgoing vice-president academic Hana Kadri said that Guscott deserves the position.

“I have the utmost faith in him,” Kadri said. “I don’t think a better candidate could have won.”

Levi Nilson acclaimed the presidency. He’s the first president to acclaim the position in decades, and one of three student association presidents in Alberta to acclaim their presidency this year. Nilson said he was pleased with the results and that he looks forward to working with the incoming executives.

“It’s gonna be a fucking sick year,” Nilson said. “This is a fantastic team. I couldn’t have asked for anything more.”

Outgoing SU president Jarett Henry was also happy with the results.

“It looks like an excellent team. This year it seemed like all the candidates were pretty knowledgeable,” Henry said.

Just over 25 per cent of undergraduate students voted, totalling 6,190 students. Last year, 7,339 students cast their vote, a 28.8 per cent voter turnout. Voter turnout was down 3.4 per cent from last year.

Henry wasn’t surprised by the lower turnout.

“There were fewer candidates. Last year there were 64 candidates, this year there were 47. So it makes sense that voter turnout was a little lower,” Henry said.

Michael Tom was elected as the undergraduate Board of Governors representative with 31 per cent of the vote.

Emily Leedham, Shubir Shaikh, Jen Tokarek and Haider Ali were elected as arts representatives.

Kaylyn Schnell and Negin Hemati were elected as engineering representatives.

The science representative positions were taken by Julie Le, Houda El Sidawi and Conrad Jaeger.

Shubidito Ahmed, Jovey Sharma won the three-way race for the two medicine representative positions.

Jordan Grant and Conrad Lowe were elected as business representatives.

Megan Kolmatiski acclaimed the sole kinesiology representative position. Education representative was acclaimed by Christopher Klune. Alicia Lunz retained her position as nursing representative. Tasneem Zaman is the new social work representative after acclaiming the position and Mark Shearer acclaimed the position of law representative. Scott Vu and Emily Macphail will stay on as senate representatives after acclaiming the two positions.

Veterinary medicine representative remained vacant as there were no candidates for the position.