Over the past years, the freshmen and general elections have consistently failed to fill all the Sanggunian positions. This year, however, the university-wide failure of the general elections leaves the Ateneo community with one question: What happens next?
The seats of the chairperson and secretary-treasurer of the School of Social Sciences, the School of Science and Engineering and the School of Humanities remain vacant. The positions of the president, vice president (VP), secretary-general and finance officer also failed to reach quota. Only the John Gokongwei School of Management was able to fill up all of its Central Board and School Board seats.
Although this is the first time that the Ateneo community experienced a failure of elections of this scale, the student government has gone without a president before. In 1984, a president was not elected. In 2001, former Sanggunian President Apples Jalandoni was suspended from office due to the alleged abuse and misuse of power, claims that were later to be found baseless. In both of these cases, however, there was a VP ready to take their place.
Earlier this year, it was revealed that Sanggunian President Dan Remo had requested for a leave of absence (LOA) for “medical reasons.” At that time, however, incumbent Sanggunian VP Ryan Yu could not take his place, as he was on LOA as an officer for the 2014 Sanggunian General Elections.
For a time, the Ateneo functioned without a Sanggunian president. This has led many to argue that the effects of this year’s failures of election and the lack of a complete Top 44 will probably go unnoticed in next academic year as well.
Many say the root cause of the failures of election is apathy. Students argue that they see no need for the Sanggunian and that they find its projects to be “irrelevant.” Moreover, some say that they do not even know what the student government truly does.
However, the Sanggunian does not only exist to protect students’ rights; rather, the student government also represents the student body in administrative affairs. It is especially crucial now that the new academic calendar is to be implemented within the next two years. The administration needs student input to effectively adjust the said calendar. The same applies to the Ateneo’s K-12 curriculum transition from 2016 to 2018.
The loss of the Sanggunian means the loss of its subsidy system, which helps students and student organizations to fund their projects, theses and conferences. The Sanggunian is also crucial in the administration’s budget allocation and process, as they collect student concerns and relay it back to the administration.
Without a complete Sanggunian, the student body stands to lose its voice. The Ateneo administration has been left to pick up the pieces and do what they can with the help of the newly elected Sanggunian officials. While some vacant positions will be up for elections again come August, only time will tell how long it will take to salvage a crippled student government.
An earlier version of this piece misstated that Jaladoni was impeached from the Sanggunian. This has since been corrected.
