Other formats

    Adobe Portable Document Format file (facsimile images)   TEI XML file   ePub eBook file  

Connect

    mail icontwitter iconBlogspot iconrss icon

Salient: Victoria University Students' Newspaper. Vol. 24, No. 7. 1961.

[introduction]

Have you realized yet that the President of the Students' Association has been elected simply by declaration because there were no other nominations? This was made plain by a Very small notice on the Executive notice-board in the main vestibule.

When were nominations called for, and when was it announced what day they would close? I do not know. I am told that these were announced on an equally small notice on this board.

There are two ways of concealing an important fact: (1) to be quite silent about it; (2) to hide it under such a mass of trivial and tedious detail that nobody could find it or realise its significance unless he knew exactly what to look for, and when and where to look.

In other words, only those already connected with Executive are likely to discover important notices on this Notice-Board. This would not have mattered if this is, not the only place where the general student public is given a chance to see these things. They could have been published in "Salient" but they were not.

This is not to question for a moment the integrity and ability of Mr Armour Mitchell, the new President. In the circumstances, it is practically certain that he would have won a contested election: because of course we prefer as President somebody with previous experience on the Executive of this University! and no previous Executive member was able to stand (the two obvious candidates being Mr O'Brien and Mr Brooker).

But suppose that we had at Vic. this year the Vice-President or President of some other University or of some training college. He (or she) should have been given a chance to stand, and, technically, so should every financial member of the Vic. Students' Association. And this means far better publicity.