On 22 April, a special General Assembly was held to discuss the Elections Commission’s decision to disqualify a student from obtaining candidacy in this semester’s Student Government elections. The Elections Commission made the decision based on their interpretation of Article III, Section Two of the constitution, which reads, “All full-time students currently enrolled in New York University Abu Dhabi, including students on campus and abroad, are members of the Student Body.” The Elections Commission ruled that since the potential candidate in question is a student who is on leave of absence, he is not a member of the student body and consequently cannot run.

However, another interpretation of this clause exists. The fact that “all full-time students currently enrolled” are recognized as “members of the Student Body” does not exclude a student on leave from inclusion as a member. In fact, it does not prevent any person from being included. During the debate, many not in favor of the student running had made a slippery slope argument, saying that a more inclusive interpretation of the clause could create a scenario in which a person who is not a student of NYUAD runs for office.

Yet this scenario will never occur, since the Elections Commission is elected by a GA with the confidence that they will execute a proper election process. The Elections Commission will proceed with their interpretation of the Constitution, which clearly limits candidacy for office to be within the scope of individuals who have ever matriculated into NYUAD. Were the Elections Commission to make a decision that included an individual out of this scope, there is no doubt that the GA would reverse that decision.

The first reason concerns the constitutionality of the special GA. If one believes that the special GA is unconstitutional, then one should also view my motion to be unconstitutional, by the very nature that my motion was raised during the special GA. Therefore, one is hypocritical at best to have one’s vote counted against my motion, all the while arguing that the GA is unconstitutional.

Those who believe that the special GA is unconstitutional, and thus decided not to be present or to abstain from voting have legitimate reasons to do so. However, every GA this semester was executed under the 24-hour notice rule. If this GA is deemed unconstitutional, then all GAs this semester should be deemed unconstitutional as well. No sensible person can possibly take such a position in the spirit of the community.

The second reason concerns respecting procedures related to constitutional decisions, a concern that some students have brought up. I am not aware of any other accusation of a procedure violation besides citing the unconstitutionality of the GA — unless there are other accusations, which I very much welcome. The paragraph above address the ludicrousness of that position.

The third reason concerns the qualifications of the potential candidate compared to existing candidates. Since the motion was about the whether the student body should include students on leave, voters should not consider the specificity of this candidacy, but should only consider the implications of including or excluding students on leave from the student body.

This brings me to the fourth reason. At present, the intention of the community, as reflected by the special GA, is to exclude students on leave from the student body. Those who voted against the motion with such intentions cannot possibly justify themselves.

Some would argue that those who are on leave are not aware of the ongoing issues at NYUAD. However, votes would necessarily reflect that unawareness. If students elected a person who is on leave of absence, it reflects students’ trust on that individual’s capabilities, integrity and relevance to the community, which should make him eligible for office.

Some would argue that those on leave made the decision to be on leave because they felt the need to isolate themselves from the NYUAD community, which would speak volumes about their incapability to serve in office. However, students choose to take a leave of absence for various reasons, including family issues, military service and academic pursuits. It is unwise to exclude all students on leave of absence from the student body for the purpose of preventing a small portion of those students from running for office, especially when it is still not clear that those who choose to isolate themselves from the community are incapable of serving.

Fundamentally, the controversy over the GA is about the inclusivity of our community. The result of the motion was a disappointment to many. Even though there is no indication that the university is established on the principle of inclusiveness, many would argue that the cosmopolitan idealism of this university and our principle of promoting cultural understanding and inclusivity should extend to individuals within our community.

Furthermore, the mere fact that this community decided not to regard a student on leave of absence to be one of us is extremely disturbing. It creates a precedent that will alienate a part of our community, which consists of some individuals who unwillingly left the community temporarily due to various reasons that are out of his or her control.

The notion of cultural Student Interest Groups is another aspect of our community that addresses the issue of inclusivity. In a university that embraces the ideal of cosmopolitanism by assembling a group of culturally and religiously diverse students, we are bound by the commitment to promote understanding by engaging in multicultural activities.

However, during my term as the Treasurer of the Student Government, there were several incidents where members of cultural SIGs implicitly excluded students who were regarded to have fallen out of the defined geographical or cultural demarcations that could be represented by those cultural SIGs.

Activities that represent minority interest in a multicultural SIG were organized on a much less regular basis, even though the minority indicated strong desire to take on the responsibility of organizing them.

Those incidents may understandably force minority interests in a SIG to remove themselves from that SIG to form their own. In the long term, we could potentially see many SIGs representing a single culture or country that have open membership in name but are implicitly exclusive. Those SIGs are dubbed cultural silos. At the same time when we seemingly gain diversity of representation, we also lose the social institution that creates cohesiveness between countries and cultures.

There are several solutions to this dilemma, but each solution requires certain prerequisites to be truly effective. We can stop recognizing all SIGs that represent a single culture or country, but that can be justified only when multicultural SIGs start representing the interest of cultures of minority.

We can recognize single country or cultural SIGs, but that can be justified only when those SIGs truly welcome all members of the student body, and remove invisible cultural barriers that are erasable.

In any case, it is imperative that students vote on the SIG recognition criteria referendum so all of us can decide our future.

Furthermore, the decision on our SIG referendum has to be based on what we think is the best way to fulfill our commitment to multiculturalism and the cosmopolitan ideal, otherwise the impressive figure of a hundred-plus represented countries inevitably loses its impact.

The implementation of inclusivity is a difficult issue to tackle, both in the case of the eligibility of students on leave to run for office and the case of SIG recognition. It is exactly the difficulty of this issue that burdens us with the responsibility of tackling it, since every decision that we make on this new campus has implications for this institution’s future.

On many occasions, preconceptions and individual political agendas might prevent us from making the best decisions for the community. However, if politics brings out the worst in people, then maybe people will bring out the best. We came to this university and participated in a grand social experiment, and will be followed by many others. As long as we all remember why we started, there is always hope.