But now that the lawsuit against the redo of the entire
election redo has been thrown out, there isn’t much of a chance of the
“reasonable” happening in the FAMU SGA mess, which is starting to look more
like a second-rate reality TV show.
A former reality TV cast member is actually at the center of
the drama. Kyle Washington, who appeared on the BET series “College Hill” in
2009, has had a big part in many negative headlines over FAMU SGA issues for years.
Articles by The FAMUan state that Washington urged the FAMU Student Senate to impeach former Student Body Presidents Phillip Agnew and Tonnette S. Graham in the past. But Agnew and Graham both stayed in office.
Graham’s vice-president, Justin Bruno, won the 2016 SGA
presidential election after facing off against the Victor Chrispin. Bruno said
that Washington was the campaign manager for Chrispin and his runningmate Pernell Mitchell.
Washington is currently the student engagement coordinator
for the FAMU Office of Communications.
Bruno and his runningmate Devin Harrison won the positions
of SGA president and vice-president by 163 votes. They received 1,366 to the
1,203 votes of the Chrispin/Mitchell ticket. Chrispin challenged the results
with an appeal to the Student Supreme Court that asked for a new election based
on allegations of voting problems at the FAMU College of Law in Orlando. The
court ruled in favor of his request, which is now being back by the administration
of President Elmira Mangum.
“Dr. Elmira Mangum agreed with the (opponents’) appeal,”
Bruno said in a quote published in the Democrat. “That is to
manipulate the election on behalf of the (FAMU) administration and other
administrators.”
Bruno said he thinks Mangum wants Chrispin on the FAMU Board of
Trustees (BOT) because they have a personal friendship that’s led her to
believe he’ll help protect her job.
“She has a better sense of security about his assistance on
the board of trustees than she has about mine, because I don’t have a personal
relationship with her, I have a professional relationship with her,” he said.
Mangum is currently in an uphill battle to get a
contract extension before her employment agreement ends on April 1, 2017. FAMU
BOT members have expressed concerns about problems such as the projected $10.5M loss
from falling enrollment for this year. The university also lost $9M+ because of the 2015-2016 enrollment decline under Mangum.
Washington spoke in favor of Mangum at the June 10 BOT meeting.
The dysfunction in the FAMU SGA elections has gone on for
months and Rattlers can expect even more negative publicity about it in
the coming weeks.