The CFS has made it official, they are denying that they received CBU’s petition to de-federate. The CBU Students’ Union is not alone in their troubles; the Kwantlen Student Association in Surrey, British Columbia is also getting the CFS run around.
Last week, CFS members from around Canada attended the National Convention. You would think with the heads of every CFS local in one spot, that they would take some time to hear the concerns of their members.
That was what I thought. At least until I received an e-mail from the Kwantlen Students Association.
The Kwantlen Students Association submitted a resolution that would have raised issues concerning the CFS’s loan to the Douglas Students’ Union.
In 2005, the CFS gave a $600,000 loan to the Douglas Students’ Union because their university refused to release the union membership fees that they collected on their behalf. The reason that the university refused to release the membership fees was that the union had not undergone a financial audit in several years. When they finally opened their books to an auditor, the auditor found that the union was suffering from “gross financial mismanagement.”
What did the CFS do to ensure they collected on the loan? CFS’s legal council appointed Marne Jensen, the general manager of the University of Victoria Students’ Society, as the receiver-manager. She was given this position even though she already had a full time job with the UVSS and even though she lacked professional qualifications as an accountant.
The CFS National Executive decided to remove the Kwantlen Student Association motion from the agenda. A press release from the Kwantlen Student Association says that they managed to make phone contact with Amanda Aziz, the National Chairperson of the CFS, and she said the resolution was removed because it made “false statements” and the CFS National Executive felt the resolution was “out of order”.
The CFS has attempted to once again silence concern surrounding the Douglas Students’ Union controversy instead of sincerely dealing with the issue. If the KSA’s resolution was really making false and misleading statements, the CFS National Executive could prove the statement’s errors through discussion and the rest of the membership could see that.
Since they are unwilling to enter into discussion surround the KSA’s resolution, it means one of two things: the Kwantlen Student Association is right and the CFS is operating under a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy or they do not think their membership is intelligent enough to pick out logical flaws and lies that are propagated by another group.
Since the CFS is obviously in favour of urgent, practical, relevant, and uncontroversial discussion, what issues did make it through to the national agenda?
There is a resolution from the Ryerson Students’ Union to label Israel as an “Apartheid State”. I may be wrong, but I fail to see how this has any relevance to student life in Canada. It seems that the CFS is content debating topics without relevance to their organization in an attempt to draw attention away from the actual state of the organization.
The CFS thinks that if they yell loud enough and silence everyone else, their version of the truth will take hold and become dominate one. What the CFS fails to realize is that the more you suppress the truth, the more you create dissent, and the truth gains more force, power, and volume. Eventually suppression of the truth reaches a point where so may have become disenfranchised and alienated by an organization that makes “false statements” and acts “out of order” that the truth explodes into the public sphere.
The CFS is sowing the seeds of their own demise and the truth will surface with more force and volume than could ever be predicted. When this happens, they have only themselves to blame.
Originally published in the Cape Breton Post on Monday, November 26, 2007.
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