Allegations fly at Frewin Court as Omkar is disqualified and Fischer resigns

The Oxford Union is currently without a President-Elect after Krishna Omkar’s win was overturned and he was banned from running again.

The Society descended into crisis after a tribunal held during the vacation found Omkar guilty of soliciting votes for himself and other candidates in the run up to Michaelmas elections – a practice prohibited by the debating society’s rules.

A re-poll for the position of President is scheduled for second week. To be eligible, candidates must have made the required number of qualifying speeches last term and not have stood in an election for a lower office last term.

Charlotte Fischer, one of only two people eligble to run in the re-poll, resigned from Standing Committee on Monday. In a long letter to Committee members she said she felt she had been the victim of “false rumours” and “personal attacks” but was resigning her position with “a heavy heart.” Claire Hennessey, who was Secretary in Michaelmas, is also eligble to run, but has suggested that she may not stand for election.

If no valid nominations are received for this term’s re-poll, it is expected that the Librarian – currently Edward Waldegrave – will assume the role of President in Trinity Term.

Everyone in the Union hierarchy of officers would then move up one position, subject to their agreement. Omkar’s electoral tribunal was brought against him by Presidential rival Fischer at the end of last term, and centred around a meeting held by Omkar in Magdalen College on the evening before elections.

The tribunal report deemed the gathering, which was attended by 20 to 30 people, including several candidates in the following day’s election, to be a deliberate attempt “to encourage all attendees to solicit votes from members of the Society the following day for those identified at the meeting.” Among those candidates at the meeting were the then Union President Luke Tryl, Charlie Holt, who was elected Secretary unopposed, and Corey Dixon, who was elected Treasurer.

Whilst union rules are vague as to precisely what is permissible with regards to gathering votes, the tribunal made it clear that the soliciting of votes from anyone other than close personal friends is not allowed.

In their official report the panel stated, “We simply reject the Defendant’s assertion that his meeting was a meeting between close personal friends, or that it was a meeting to have the sort of discussion which might be had between close personal friends.”

Omkar was also criticised for sending out an email which contained the names of Union members in Merton College.

The panel decided that it was used to approach people and systematically solicit votes. In an unprecedented move the tribunal also disqualified Omkar from standing in all future Union elections. Omkar strongly denied any suggestion that he had acted improperly by holding a drinks party on the night before last term’s election.

The 5000- word official report released after the tribunal criticises Omkar for “lack of integrity” and “arrogance as he appeared before us.” Omkar appealed the decision, but a second panel that met on Saturday December 15 upheld the tribunal’s findings in full, although they did consult the original prosecuting panel about the severity of the sentence.

Omkar argued before both panels that he was simply being penalised for what was accepted common practice in the Union.

The Union’s Returning Officer received a signed confession from Union debater Jessica Lund stating that she sent a text message to seven people that read, “Please, please, for a more open, democratic Union, vote Charlotte Fischer for President. You won’t regret it, and it will make me very happy. Thank you. Xxx”. Fischer denies asking anybody to send a message on her behalf, and there is no evidence linking Fischer to Lund’s actions.

Fischer depicts uglier side of Union in farewell letter

In a 3000-word resignation letter to Standing Committee written on Monday night, Fischer accused Krishna Omkar and other members of spreading “his own distorted projection of who I am.”

She also alleges that she was repeatedly sexually harassed by committee members. In one part of the letter, she wrote:

“It has become more difficult to be involved in the Union more recently because of the actions of some of the members of Standing Committee. Most recently I have continued to receive text and Facebook messages from several members of the standing committee asking if I “fancy a fuck?” When I called the member whose phone the original messages were sent from, I received no answer, only further messages asking me if “that was an offer of phone sex gorgeous?”… In the context of the ongoing controversy and conflict I have with many of the members of Standing Committee I feel it was insensitive at best and outrageously obnoxious at worst.”

A source on Standing committee said he felt the comments had been taken out of context. In a response to Fischer’s letter Omkar said, “I have no desire to launch personal attacks against any individual through the medium of the press… With full respect to the tribunal, the decision of which remains unimpeached, last term’s election returned an unprecedented and overwhelming democratic mandate, of which I am mindful and for which I will always remain grateful.

Hundreds of spectators turned up to watch the Oxford men and women’s blues teams ski to victory at this year’s races, held on the Varsity Trip in Val Thorens, France. Vin chaud and hot dogs kept the crowds warm as a DJ pumped music onto the slopes and the Oxford and Cambridge ski teams slalomed their way down the flood lit course, finishing through an enormous Varsity Trip inflatable arch to the cheers of their supporters. The Giant Slalom races were held during the day in terrible conditions. With a snow storm, strong wind and a badly cut up course, it was not a surprise that the Olympic race piste, which was one of the longest and most challenging in Varsity history, took its share of victims. The money was on the Oxford men’s blues team (Adrien Geiger (capt), Freddie Clough, George Hamer, Freddie Athill, Phil Senior, Laurence Whyatt) to hold on to the cup, however ex Great Britain team member Freddie Clough and highly ranked BUSC racer Phil Senior were quickly sent crashing out of the course and into the side netting. Four out of six team members must complete the course to avoid a heavy time penalty, so with the first and third seeds down, the remaining four skiers put up a brave fight and played it safe to stay in the game, however the Oxford blues were far behind Cambridge, with 12.61 seconds to make up in the Slalom races. Meanwhile the top four Oxford women blues finished well and were close on the heels of an exceptionally strong Cambridge side. The Slalom races started in the evening, along with the crowds and entertainment. All racers were keen to impress, and above all, the Oxford Blues men, who knew they had to make up vital seconds. This time all six team members made it down with exceptional times. After a tense wait and a nerve wracking announcement, whereby Oxford… no… Cambridge… no… Oxford were finally declared the overall Winners by just 0.92s. The Oxford Women’s Blues team also managed to shave off enough seconds, beating Cambridge equivalents in exciting races. The Oxford Men’s second team were less fortunate and lost to their counterparts due Christian Reinecke’s controversial disqualification, who finished the course with a superb time but on only one ski, which breaks international FIS regulations. The men’s third team and women’s second team won by impressive margins. The Varsity Trip 07 was the biggest and most successful in history, with 1700 Oxbridge students descending on Val Thorens, one of the highest resorts in the French Alps, for two weeks of racing, freestyle events, and debauched behaviour.by Frederick Athill

 ****The amorality of a businessman driven by greed; his brother weak, without the moral courage to say no. Thoughtlessness, operating in a moral vacuum; power and irresponsibility. The sight of a suited businessman wielding a gun, perhaps the most terrifying and ruthless spectacle. This is a believable and realistic film, despite the director’s description of it as ‘melodrama’.
The normality evident in the first half is no veneer: it is only the drastic events later on which separate the brothers from anyone else. Albert Finney excels as the father and a powerful family dynamic emerges, exposing long held resentments, disappointments and betrayals. They are all despicable characters once their lives start to unravel, indeed Hank (Ethan Hawke) tries to make a stand so late on that the Rubicon is barely visible. There are some excellent moments, such as the skag head who reminds Phillip Seymour Hoffman (exquisite acting) of himself. The latter bullies his younger brother into the ploy with the words “It’s too late to think”.
Hawke portrays to a tee the pathetic, bungling fool that he has been typecast as by his family. Ultimately we raise questions about the parenting of these screwed up adults. Finney apologises and, despite his grief, his actions at the end are based on pure hate. The daughter appears to have turned into a Christian nut. But if all the characters are despicable, what can we draw from the film? A warning? They lose their perspective and give way to base bestial instincts almost; Hank’s instinct is always to run.
The story is told in fragments with the robbery occurring at the start and the build up shown afterwards, spliced up before the denouement. Suspense is certainly not lacking in the first half; it becomes like watching an awful train wreck. “The world is an evil place. Some people realise that and get rich, others are destroyed”, a grim analysis which seems bleakly accurate in the world Lumet presents. This is a worthy addition to the work of a legendary director. It could hardly rival the enclosed drama of 12 Angry Men or the peculiar beauty of Dog Day Afternoon, but the same passion for exploring behaviour remains and bears witness to a very American and sadly common phenomenon.by Hilary Aked 

A Jesus student was hospitalized and left badly scarred after a near-fatal accident on the college ski trip. On the first night of a college trip to Tignes in the French Alps 20 yearold Ed Bloch hit a snow drift, lost a ski, fell and impaled himself on the end of one of his poles. The accident took place in appalling weather conditions with poor visibility and a dangerously bumpy piste. Second-year medical student Bloch said, “It felt like a painful winding at first, so I got up and we skied to the village. I just thought I would sit a couple out to get my breath back. As I got down to the village it got quite hard to breath and pretty painful, so I asked for directions for the medical centre, by which time I was very pale and worse for wear, so we called an ambulance.” Bloch was rushed to a nearby hospital where an ultrasound scan revealed he had ruptured his spleen six times and bled three litres of blood into his abdominal cavity. “I started going into hypovolaemic shock and was short of breath, so they had to operate on me straight away in the very small hospital, “he said. “Doctors told me I was lucky to be alive.” He woke up with a six inch scar across his stomach. Unable to leave hospital until several days after the rest of the college team had gone home, he lost two and a half stone in the course of his nil-by-mouth recovery. He has been warned against contact sports for a further two months and will need to take regular antibiotics for a minimum of three years. Close friend Piers Lemoine visited Bloch several times in hospital at Bourgs Saint-Maurice. “The hospital was a bit rubbish, but Ed had a lot of visitors,” he said. He added, “He was very thin and seemed pretty bored at times, but I thought he kept in remarkably high spirits.”

Astonishing judges and spectators alike, the Oxford Sirens cheerleaders took 2nd place in their division at the Future Cheer Winter Wonderland competition in London on Sunday 2 December. Beaten only by the Scottish Bluebells and led by coach Brid Cronin and captain Jennifer Loh, the Sirens wowed the competition by performing a heart-pumping routine that included difficult aerial stunts, sky-high jumps, and challenging gymnastics. Co-captains of choreography, Hannah Whittell and Cally Humphrey, spiced up the routine with their headturning dance moves that energized everyone from the judges to the spectators. Whilst roughly half of the 2007-08 Sirens team has never done cheerleading before, Loh says of her squad, “I am immensely proud to be captain this year of such a hard-working and dedicated team. My fellow Sirens continue to amaze me in their abilities to master complex cheerleading maneuvers, especially when so many of them are coming at the sport for the first time.” The ‘finished product’ of competitive cheerleading is a 2-½ minute routine set to rousing music and performed in front of a wild crowd. Many Sirens say the experience of being on that special blue gymnastics mat at competition is a whirlwind that rushes by in the blink of an eye. But the work that goes into preparing for that 2-½ minutes is anything but ephemeral. Practicing three or four times a week, the Sirens put a hefty amount of effort into their sport. The intensity of training increases significantly in the days approaching a competition, but Loh is convinced this pays dividends: “cheerleading is about being positive and being part of a team.” And indeed being positive is something the Sirens – like all great cheerleading squads – have learned to master. Meet a Siren on the streets of Oxford and he or she is likely to greet you warmly and ask how your day is going – the sort of social custom it would be nice to see more people adopt. Fortunately, Oxford will soon be seeing more shining Sirens faces around campus, as the squad is actively recruiting new members to join its trophy-winning ranks. With a massive recruitment event set for this Sunday 13 January (4:30 – 6:30 PM, Iffley Road Sports Centre), the Sirens are hoping to add more athletes of both sexes and all levels of experience to their roster. The team looks forward to entering three major competitions next term, and the more Sirens, the better. Whilst cheerleading is still fairly small in the UK, it is undeniably expanding as a serious sporting activity for everyone from children to university-level athletes.by Justine Ramsden

*** This piece of new writing comes from the pen of director Helen McCabe. It’s a thoughtful piece of drama about the relationship between John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor, which was complicated by the fact that Harriet was married. Mill, Harriet and her husband John are all acted with sensitivity and the dynamics in this love triangle are well portrayed.It is hard to reawaken characters like John Stuart Mill, known for his long debates transcribed onto dusty pages. His legacy in liberalism and feminism also make him notorious. In writing this play, Mc- Cabe has done well in conjuring up the ghosts of real and interesting figures, although one feels she is limited by a (commendable) desire to stick to what history tells us really happened, instead of taking risks with the past.The play relies excessively on poetry and debate; there is not enough drama. The arguments that feature heavily about the position of married women are no longer relevant to modern society. This kind of debate, name-dropping of contemporary political characters, and poetry read aloud weighs down the play and sometimes makes it slow-paced. Despite its thoughtful script and excellent acting, the questions asked in the play are not hard-hitting or relevant enough for a modern audience, and the play feels heavy as a result.By Elen Griffiths

What do you mean you didn’t know that Tom Hanks singled-handedly ended the Cold War? This strange black comedy focuses on the covert machinations of the US government in the Soviet-Afghan war of the ‘80s, which seem absurd enough to be unbelievable, but we are assured are almost entirely true. The film begins with a military ceremony honouring Congressman Charlie Wilson (Hanks) for bringing down Communism – a more traditional conflict for American war movies. The music swells, the crowd cheer, and it seems possible that this is going to be another of those Captain America war films which the US seems to be mass producing. We leave our expectations behind, however, in the next scene, where we start at the beginning in 1980. We find this same congressman learning of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan on a TV broadcast, whilst at a Las Vegas hot-tub party surrounded by strippers and lines of cocaine. This Texan lothario, whose greatest achievement in his six terms as a congressman, as it is commented later, ‘is being re-elected five times’ is prodded into action by born-again socialite and Charlie’s sometime lover Joanne Herring (Julia Roberts) and grumpy CIA operative Gust Avrakotos (Philip Seymour Hoffman). Charlie’s initial sympathy for the plight of the Afghans transforms into a decade of struggle to increase the US budget for covertly arming the Afghan Mujahedeen. Screenwriter Aaron Sorkin, wellversed in political satire from the acclaimed TV series The West Wing, brings his typical high-brow, rapidfire dialogue and humour to even the most intense moments. A terse conversation between Charlie and President Zia of Pakistan for instance, becomes bafflingly funny. The film reconciles the poignant and the humorous, and creates an incisive, entertaining black comedy. The same cannot be said of the character of Charlie Wilson, whose party-hard bravado is never quite resolved with the great man he somehow becomes. Hanks relaxes into the role enough to make him likeable, at least. However, there’s little chemistry between Hanks and Roberts, who is also plausible, if too brittle and entirely overshadowed by her blonde, gravity-defying bouffant. It is Hoffman who shines, with his disgruntled frustration and sarcasm, perfect for Sorkin’s style. While the victory seems clear cut, what is curiously not specifically mentioned is that the Afghan freedom fighters the US financed became the core of Al-Qaeda, a bitter irony which one would expect the filmmakers to exploit. As Charlie puts it, ‘we fucked up the endgame.’ While some might say the same about the ending of Charlie Wilson’s War, the saving graces are the subtle, yet emotive hints at the fate which America had in store, and may suffer again if lessons aren’t learnt. by Laura Williams

 Despite the defeat of the Blues side at Twickenham on the 6th of December, there is still plenty of rugby to look forward to in Hilary term; with Cuppers to follow the conclusion of the league campaign. And with many games cancelled at the end of last term, due to both the weather and commitments to the ‘College Varsity’ match, the competition is looking far more open than it has in previous years. However, it seems some things never change and Keble are once again looking strong at the top of college rugby. They have three games left this season, and if they manage to maintain their form from last term there are few who seriously doubt that the league trophy will once again be theirs. The excitement in the top flight mostly rests on the potentially four-way battle to be the ‘best of the rest’, with St. Catz, Teddy Hall, Christ Church and Magdalen all in the hunt. It is St. Catz that currently have the upper hand however, with a game in hand over both Hall and Christ Church. A challenge from Magdalen looks least likely, they are the furthest adrift and will also be struggling to deal with the loss of their South African outside half, Alastair Brown. Newly promoted Trinity/LMH look likely to go down, but a poor run of results from any of the other sides could see them survive. Looking to Division Two, and St. Peters are looking set to return to the best six of college rugby, only dropping one point in their first three games. The battle for the second promotion spot could well come down to the Wadham vs. Pembroke match in the first week of term. This crunch game will prove crucial to deciding their fates, and demonstrates the importance of the draw that Wadham secured against a strong St. Peters side last term. Meanwhile, the decent of Corpus Christi/Sommervile continues; they are yet to win a game in the third division, and following on from a very poor first season, things are looking bad for them. Casting our eyes to the very bottom of the table, Brasenose and Hertford are propping up the rest of the league, both still seeking their first win at the bottom of the fourth. There remain many exciting games, across all four divisions, this season in the league calender. However the high point of Hilary Term comes with the the return of the University players and the beginning of Cuppers, which we all hope will prove a true showcase of the talent on show across the colleges. There are several teams capable of mounting a strong challenge, and while it is hard to look past Keble for the title, there are opponents both traditional and new that will be looking to topple them. The draw will be made directly after the end of the league season, and we’ll have to wait until then to see when the big games will be. The battle for the Plate looks to be as wide open as it is every year, with it impossible to narrow down the potential winners. Throughout the term, there seems to be much to look forward to in Hilary for both the players and supporters of college rugby.by Jack Marsh

The Desert of the Real is about love. It’s about war. It’s about the contrast between characters in Britain and Iraq. And it has been written by two Oxford oddballs, Max Seddon and Ben Judah, who make bizarre yet somehow productive playwrights.Seddon and Judah are a nightmare to interview. They spark ideas off each other, interrupt, backchat – this is an incredible conversation, but a meandering one, and difficult to transcribe. Seddon is heavily jetlagged, and Judah talks like he’s on speed: a million miles a minute.Their play, The Desert of the Real, unfolds as Oxford student Alice travels to Iraq leaving her boyfriend Nick behind. As Seddon explains, ‘She goes, and what’s going to happen to Nick when she’s gone? What happens when your girlfriend leaves you, for Iraq – for a place, for an idea? And then this Iraqi shows up and everything is completely swept out from under Nick, because this whole other world is intruding on him.’ The play contrasts Alice’s experiences in Iraq with Nick’s in Britain, adding a host of colourful characters in between.Between them, the two writers have a wealth of experience to draw on. Seddon’s play was in the Edinburgh festival this year, while Judah spent the summer bluffing his way through Middle Eastern war zones – he travelled through Syria, Lebanon and Iraq. Judah is still buzzing from his trip, putting on accents, telling me anecdotes of being held up at gunpoint at checkpoints, filing stories as a war correspondent and nearly being taken hostage. Judah’s story makes for fascinating drama in itself; yet it is Seddon who grounded the Iraqi story in British reality and focused on an Oxford couple. ‘Max came up with the idea of “desert of the real,” which was this interrogation of different layers of reality: what was real in Britain, what was real in Iraq.’This is an ambitious project: it aims to cover a diverse range of experiences without being dogmatic. As Seddon says earnestly, ‘It’s not hammering an idea, we don’t have a big thing like “ooh, the Iraq war is bad”. So often political plays are weighed down by the message, and we are not either arrogant or stupid enough to do that. [The play] is about what a war and mixing of realities does to people.’Then Judah butts in: ‘It’s about how a couple feel about each other, it’s about how an Iraqi deals with his lost country, it’s about how these various characters that Alice meets in Iraq are living their life in this world where violence and identity are real.’And, importantly, it’s about love – but not love as you would imagine it. As Judah explains, ‘The characters in the play are all deeply in love with something; either in love with their lost homelands, or their idea of god, or they’re in love with each other, in the case of the Oxford couple.’ Did they base the romantic emotions on personal experience too, I ask? They squirm. Then Seddon pipes up: ‘I mostly made them up. I use little snippets that happen to me, or phrases that my friends have said.’ I am curious about this creative process, this double act of writing. Most of the writing takes place outside term time, Seddon tells me, and the pair meet to compare notes. So what is it like working together, I ask, hoping for gossip. They reassure me that they write well together, without too many disputes: ‘we both share the same goals and ideas,’ Judah tells me. ‘The original idea is that I wrote the scenes in Iraq, he wrote the scenes set in Oxford. Then we passed it around, rewrote each others’ dialogue…’So who wins the disputes about dialogue? ‘The play wins,’ they tell me earnestly. Yet I sense that Judah, as the wisecracker, fast-talker, is the more dominant of the two. ‘When Ben asked me if I smoke, I said no,’ Seddon says. ‘He said, “But you’re with Ben Judah, you must smoke! Here, have a pack!” Now it would be wrong to do this play without smoking.’How did they first meet? Seddon smiles. ‘We met properly in April, we were with the Cherwell drama editor of the time, and Ben smashed this guy’s sink with a wine bottle…’ I gasp, and look over at Ben for an explanation. He shrugs. ‘Eh…I was being Israeli.’ I raise my eyebrows, and hope that I will get out of this meeting and get to see the play alive, sink intact.By Elen Griffiths

Cincinnati sextet The National have been one of music’s best kept secrets over the past 5 years. With the release of their fourth album, Boxer, they have finally started to find the attention their wide-eyed melancholic rock has long deserved. The seeds of their momentum were sown with 2005’s Alligator, an album among the best of the decade so far and a slow-burning critical success. They seemed to exist in a bubble for most of their career, outside hype and fashion, sounding nothing like their peers and drawing instead from the soft romanticism of Nick Cave and Tindersticks. Their albums are quintessential ‘growers’; they have a habit of creeping up on you when you least expect it, in the way that great albums do. Because of this, they have a devoted fan-base. To know The National is to love them. Lead singer and lyricist Matt Berninger is phlegmatic about the gentle trajectory of their career: ‘We had been operating in the dark for so long that we started to just accept the fact that we’d always be overlooked. We’ve tried to just focus on the songs and not worry so much about the rest of it. That being said, we’re very happy that people are now starting to pay attention. We didn’t expect Boxer to get the attention that it has. It’s very satisfying.’ Where do they see themselves fitting in? ‘We tried to start our own scene. We called it “heartcore”’, Berninger replies, ‘but it never caught on.’ After the word-of-mouth acclaim garnered by Alligator and the resulting extensive tour, how did the band cope with the follow-up? ‘Boxer took a very long time to get right. There were moments when we thought we would never figure it out. By the time we finished it we had lost all perspective. It wasn’t until I took it home after mastering and laid down on my couch with a bottle of wine that I realised how good it was. It was a huge relief.’ Berninger’s lyrics have always been intensely personal, and Boxer sees him react to the realities of being in an international touring band. ‘One of the main reasons Boxer took so long was because I needed to reconnect and go back to work and walk around the neighbourhood. A lot of it is about the struggle to stay connected and hold on to the things that matter.’ While many successful artists write about the burdens of touring and dealing with the media, Berninger sings about the struggle to keep grounded in an unpretentiously human way. It is this humanity that forms one of the major appeals of The National. They are everymen. This becomes particularly clear in person. While the band are remarkably adept in the live arena, transforming the dynamics of many of their songs, Berninger remains charmingly embarrassed onstage. ‘I’m not a natural showman. There are times when I wish I could crawl through the floor, but there are also moments of exhilarating happiness. I wish I could control it.’ Yet his deep baritone coupled with the intensity of his fellow musicians make for a compelling live experience. After the plaudits garlanded on Boxer in 2007’s end of year polls, this year sees the release of A Skin, A Night, a short film about the band made by young French director Vincent Moon and an appearance at All Tomorrow’s Parties in May.by Carl Cullinane