What Your Future Holds, EMPOWER or OPEN?
By Ng Min Xi
Photos by Lee Suh Sian
It is funny how our alma mater reflects the reality of our life to be. The SRC election is one such reflection.
The students have finally gotten their first physical exposure of the candidates with the round of campaigning speeches at the canteen today.
With their omnipresent posters and heavy usage of social media, you should have at least heard of the group of five called EMPOWER. On the flip side, there is only another group contesting against them, an army of seven calling themselves OPEN.
The Players: EMPOWER
On a fundamental level, EMPOWER preaches about ‘empowering’ the students. Their idea revolves around the concept that the SRC cannot make a difference by itself but a united student body can make a change, with the SRC leading them of course.
They brought the SRC into a new stage with the usage of the phrase ‘student movement’. This has never before been emphasised, but it has the effect of showing the students just how serious they are about making real change, to the level that they would resort to activism.
Members of EMPOWER are convincing students with their passion, even their campaign speech mirrors that. They are also not holding back on using every arsenal in their disposal to make themselves heard. The combination of these two elements produces a voice that is sincere and loud and it is paying off, the students are noticing it.
EMPOWER has hitherto maintained a pro-student tone. This is their biggest strength and also their biggest weakness. Many students enjoy the fact that there are people out there fighting for their rights.
There are also those who believe that being too pro-student is unhealthy, that the UTAR administrative should work with the students in their affairs and not against.
It is a sentiment that many students share.
Another major drawback for EMPOWER is their position with the DSA. In short, they are not favoured by the administration.
It plays with logic and reason. They first establish that the policies set by UTAR are reasonable, effective and fixed in stone. This is true in a sense, many of the policies are logically crafted if you look at them, however it does not mean that the current policies cannot be changed to be more efficient or in a few cases, effective.
In OPEN’s case, they should push a balance instead of striking off changing UTAR’s policies as something impossible. Sure, they can argue that most policies work, but arguing that all policies work and should not be changed, is suicide.
On the plus side they are advocating about a new system whereby students will know the status of the SRC’s proposals. The process basically works this way - if elected, they will come up with a proposal for students’ problems, let’s say a demand for more parking space.
The proposal can either be rejected or approved, either way the results will be published on the SRC board.
However if the proposal is rejected, they will demand a reason from the DSA, let’s for example’s sake presume that there are financial constraints stopping UTAR from having more parking space. They will then publish and enumerate these reasons and finally find a solution for each of them until there are no more reasons to reject the aforementioned proposal.
The fact is both teams’ methods are possible. For EMPOWER, their method relies on the unity of students and their motivation to be proactive, it is probably more effective and in a loose sense, fun.
As for OPEN, it is almost solely based on how committed the team is to their cause, because in the end, what they advocate is a system that works based on what the group of 13 called SRC can achieve by itself.
So in this aspect, if things stay as what they are, a student can vote for OPEN if they have the confidence that this team will go all-out in coming up with working solutions to old problems and expect the DSA to take action.
Campaign contradictions
Voting for EMPOWER is treading on unchartered waters, activism is a risk especially in a society like ours. It may attract dangerous attention even beyond the confined comfort of our alma mater.
There is also a nagging thought at the back of my mind that asks – Even if EMPOWER does not get elected, can’t they still continue with what they are advocating?
That is namely ‘empowering’ students to unite and achieve something great together, to finally have a single voice from thousands of students demanding for their rights.
It does not take the SRC to do that, it just takes someone committed to the cause to start the domino effect. It might be a good idea for EMPOWER to start telling people what they are going to do with the SRC’s power.
Are they going to voice out to the President? But older committees have already done that. Then surely they will resort to activism when their voice is not heard. But then you do not need to be SRC to do that. It is quintessentially circular logic, one which EMPOWER must break out off.
In a similar sense, OPEN calls itself the opposition and yet proceeds to support the DSA, a contradictory statement and mistake that should not be made at this stage.
There is another important aspect that both teams should take into account.
Fishing the votes
There are two categories of students. At one corner are those that are politically aware with the happenings around UTAR, who will decide and choose which of the nominees should be elected and be part of a history of change.
While at another corner are those who stare at their food when the most heated campaigning speeches on campus are being articulated.
Members of EMPOWER consist of students that are known to be active in student right’s movements, albeit them being small-scaled ones. This has turned into a major advantage against OPEN, because the majority of students, who would even bother to vote, are those that are politically aware, namely those who know about EMPOWER and will get off their seats to support them.
OPEN is in trouble if they keep at this pace, they have to resort to doing two things, either pulling the voters over or getting passive students to became their voters.
When it all boils down, EMPOWER and OPEN are two groups that appeal to people with different mindsets, that is all. They have different interest groups supporting them but ultimately the students will choose the candidates that are sincere and committed.
And then hopefully, finally, UTAR can have ‘change that we can believe in’.
It is funny how our alma mater reflects the reality of our life to be.
