Genevieve Athis has been elected to the Union presidency for Trinity term 2019, with her Empower slate taking all four officer positions.
Athis won 950 first preferences, meeting the quota for election in the first round, beating rival New Way candidate Nick Brown’s 539 first preferences.
She told Cherwell: “I am honoured and humbled to have been elected President of the Oxford Union. I couldn’t have done it without the team of people I had around me and I look forward to working with them to put together an exciting and diverse term card and putting into place our policies to empower members to get the most out of their membership, regardless of background.
“Through this I hope that we can work towards making the Union a more inclusive space where no one is ever afraid to make their voice heard.”
In the race for Treasurer-Elect Charlie Coverman defeated Gemma Timmons by 697 to 686, whilst Nick Leah beat out both rival slate’s Olivia Railton with 509 first preferences and independent candidate Maxim Parr-Reid with 255 first preferences.
Empower’s Sara Singh Dube also defeated New Way’s Becky Collins for the position of Librarian elect, winning 801 first preferences to Collins’ 592.
Elected to Standing Committee were Chaitanya Kediyal, Shining Zhao, Mahi Joshi, Jim Brennan, Elliot Bromley, Olivia Leigh, and Rai Saad Khan.
Empower won four of the available Standing Committee seats to New Way’s two. One independent candidate, Jim Brennan, was also elected.
Six seats on Secretary’s Committee went to Empower compared to four for New Way and one for independent candidate George Hargrave.
In total the Returning Officer recorded 1649 votes, compared to 1069 votes in the elections held at the Trinity last year.
The ‘Empower’ slate has won a resounding victory in a race in which the future of slates is in doubt, with the Union’s membership having voted to abolish them for the elections held next term.
Nick Brown did not respond to a request for comment.
