The candidates have been finalized, and campaigning has officially commenced, for the 2015 UMSU General Election. The deadline for candidates’ nominations applications passed on Friday, Feb. 13 at 5 p.m.

Two slates, previously reported by the Manitoban, have been confirmed as the only two in the race for executive seats. The names of the slates have also been confirmed: Clear Slate and Your UMSU.

Clear Slate consists of Spencer Yasui running for president; women’s representative Reanna Blair running for vice-president external; Zach Leclerc running for vice-president internal; Bénédicte LeMaître running for vice-president student services; and Jesse Greenberg running for vice-president advocacy.

Shawn Singh is registered as campaign manager for the Clear Slate.

Your UMSU is composed of outgoing vice-president internal Jeremiah Kopp running for president; international students’ representative Astitwa Thapa running for vice-president external; Christopher Bélanger running for vice-president internal; Jessica Morrison running for vice-president student services; and Rebecca Kunzman running to retain her position as vice-president advocacy.

The registered campaign manager for Your UMSU is Matt Carvell, who was selected by UMSU as the chair for UMSU Council over the course of the 2014-15 executive year.

Candidates for UMSU’s five community representative positions were also finalized, including three that had not been identified in a preliminary list of candidates reported by the Manitoban.

Three candidates were confirmed for students living with disabilities representative: Alan Bridgeman; Daniel Tingskou; and current representative Andrew Fenwick, who was elected to the then-vacant position by UMSU Council at a meeting in October.

Two candidates were confirmed in the race for women’s representative: Alana Robert and Fariba Shakibani.

Only one candidate applied for each of the remaining three community representative positions. Running unopposed means that candidates will be required to collect more votes in favour of than against in order to be elected.

Current Aboriginal students’ representative Will Landon is running to retain his seat after having been elected by UMSU Council to the then-vacant position at a meeting in October. Charles Kimball will be running for LGBTTQ* representative, and Mujtaba Abdul Jalil will be running for international students’ representative.

The campaigning period for the election officially opened on Feb. 23 at 9 a.m. and ends on March 6. The voting period is held from March 4 to 6 at polling stations to be available throughout the university.

Visit the official UMSU General Election website, operated by the Chief Returning Officer, at umsu.ca/elections for more information.

Edited on Feb. 28, 2015