LUSU grabs headline

The editor of a student newspaper hopes to fill a hole in their editorial policy after the student union pulled a front page story from the paper at the last minute.

The current edition of Lakehead University’s The Argus has half of its front page missing after the Lakehead University Student Union pulled an article. The article pulled focused on allegations of fraud in the recent LUSU executive elections.

Argus editor-in-chief Ian Kaufman said because the paper is part of LUSU, he had sent the student union a copy of the article before going to press.

"It’s obviously a sensitive topic so we wanted to give them some input," Kaufman said. "I think almost the exact words were ‘if you print this, we’re shutting you down.’"

When Kaufman asked why LUSU didn’t want the article printed, the union replied with legal concerns, but would not elaborate.

So Kaufman decided to run the article.

Without the paper’s knowledge, LUSU called the printer and had the story removed. Kaufman said he and his staff had no idea the story was pulled until they saw the printed paper. Kaufman calls the move highly inappropriate.

He said the paper has drafted an amendment to the LUSU constitution to ensure greater editorial autonomy for The Argus.

"There’s nothing really illegal about what they did however I think it’s pretty obviously sketchy that they would censor an article without telling us," Kaufman said.

The story, which is available online despite its being pulled from the paper’s print edition, alleges that a student was caught on camera stuffing a ballot box from his pocket while a poll clerk watched. LUSU vice-president of finance Chris Vaillant said the claims made in the article may not be true.

“There is currently an ongoing investigation however all of those rumours are hearsay," Vaillant said.

He added that the decision to pull the article was made after it was recommended by legal counsel, because LUSU runs the Argus.

"Following our own due diligence in preventing any legal repercussions the article was pulled," said Vaillant.

The results of LUSU’s first election, during the week of Feb. 7, were invalidated after a number of breaches, including polling stations being located in the wrong places. The revote was done on March 22 and 23.

Vice-president of Finance candidate Franz Masini said the count from four polling stations, including one outside of The Outpost, where the alleged ballot-stuffing took place, were highly suspicious.

Masini said he requested LUSU conduct an investigation, the results of which will be announced Friday at a LUSU meeting.

"Due to the suspicious numbers something is definitely going on," Masini said. "The fact that this happened is just totally disturbing."

Kaufman said between the censoring of the article and allegations of a few students tampering with an election, he hopes it doesn’t contribute to student apathy, which is a topic The Argus has run numerous articles on in the past.

With the exception of removing the article, Kaufman said he think LUSU has handled the issues surrounding the elections well.

"It’s kind of a PR disaster for LUSU so hopefully that alone will be enough to teach them a lesson," Kaufman said. "I think students are jaded about LUSU and it will be unfortunate if this aggravates that."

Fourth year commerce student Aaron McNeil said he usually votes in student elections but chose not to in the most recent vote because he’s graduating this year. McNeil said between low turnout and allegations of fraud, students who care are fed up.

"To me it seems like the student body is completely and utterly disenchanted with LUSU right now," McNeil said.