News

Craccum editor Thomas Dykes is here to stay after a vote to remove from his position at the Auckland students’ magazine failed on Thursday April 26.

The vote was held at an Auckland University Students’ Association (AUSA) Special General Meeting (SGM) to consider a motion of no confidence against Dykes. The motion had arisen from a petition against Dykes last month by a number of AUSA members. The final result of the vote was 144-83 against the motion, with 10 abstentions.

After one hour of robust debate, voting was taken by dividing those for and against the motion to separate sides of the AUSA Quad. “The discussion at the SGM was good, with plenty of time to hear views from all sides,” said AUSA President Arena Williams.

The SGM ended on a hopeful note with a handshake between Thomas Dykes and Kirk Jacinto, one of the students behind the motion of no confidence.

Jacinto later told Critic he thought the result was “brilliant actually,” and praised the amount of people who turned out and who will now hopefully contribute to Craccum.

Dykes seemed to agree, urging students at the SGM to contribute a broader range of content. Responding to the criticism levelled at the magazine that it was too political, he said, “I’m not going to write your rightwing articles for you. You write them, I’ll publish them.” This seemed a slightly odd thing to say given that the magazine was accused of having too much political content overall, but Critic has grown well accustomed to the series of nonsensical comments it receives from Craccum and AUSA.

Meanwhile back in Dunedin Critic has rebellious plots of its own, with plans to solve Craccum’s problems once and for all by breeding with the magazine to create a super-student-publication to be named Criticum. Readers can expect Criticum to emerge, fully formed and in all her beauty in approximately nine months’ time.