Farah accused of bribing students

Late Tuesday evening, officials confirmed that an investigation is brewing after allegations surfaced that former Student Association President Hassan Farah attempted to bribe two students for this week's election.

'I can confirm that there are rumors of two instances of alleged bribery,' said Joshua Boston, head of the SA Elections and Credentials Committee and former managing editor of The Spectrum. 'It's concerning the offering of positions by Hassan Farah to people who are involved in SA and the election.'

Farah immediately denied the claims.

'We run a clean campaign,' Farah said. 'People are trying to ruin my reputation.'

The Spectrum received a tip from an anonymous party that one of the parties approached by Farah was presidential-hopeful Joseph Assaf. According to Boston, Farah allegedly offered Assaf a position with the Faculty-Student Association.

'Nobody talked to me. It's someone's rumors and lies,' Assaf said. 'If I wanted to drop out of the race, I would drop out in front of everybody. Everything is lies.'

According to SA's Election Rules and Regulations, a bribe is 'money or any other valuable consideration given or promised with a view to corrupting the behavior of a person in effort to influence an election.'

Per Article 10, Section XIII, 'Attempting to bribe any undergraduate student of his/her vote or to induce such student to commit an illegal act or act in violation of these Election Rules and Regulations [results in] 75 hours of community service for the first act, or expulsion from the election for additional acts.'

As of 10:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Boston did not speak to Farah but is taking the allegations seriously.

'The committee will look thoroughly into these allegations,' Boston said. 'Of course, I want to emphasize that Hassan Farah is innocent until proven guilty based off of any hearings by the committee and after we speak to the parties involved.'

With the election beginning at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, Boston believes that time is of the essence when investigating these claims.

'There is not too much that we can do until the election begins,' Boston said. 'Everyone will be in one place and we can pull everyone together. We are independent and we have the power to investigate this and that is what we will do.'

Farah blamed those who are against his campaign for spreading the information – which he calls false – to the masses.

'It's a surprise to me,' Farah said. 'Here's the dirty politics. It's the same people spreading rumors to make way for themselves. These are the same politics they've played since the incident happened. They made rumors and allegations that had no basis. This is clearly the campaign that they are running.'

The Spectrum
Managing Editor David Jarka contributed to this report.