Claims Spark Debate in UC

The debate surrounding the sudden resignation of former Undergraduate Council (UC) Vice President Ian W. Nichols ’06 reignited last week, after an op-ed published in The Crimson alleged questionable dealings by the UC’s executive board.

Several UC members have disputed the accuracy of the op-ed written by Jason L. Lurie ’05, a UC representative from Cabot House and a biweekly Crimson columnist.

After Nichols unexpectedly announced his resignation earlier this month, former UC vice-presidential candidate Clay T. Capp ’06 defeated Lurie by a 22-20 vote. In his op-ed, Lurie claimed that some members of the UC had pressured Nichols into leaving office and discouraged representatives from running against Capp.

“At least one possible opponent of Capp’s received the implied threat that a potential job would be withheld after graduation if that person ran against Capp,” Lurie wrote, citing this as one of several “shady backdoor political maneuvers.”

UC Treasurer S. Faraz Munaim ’06 said that that line refers to him and was a misrepresentation of the e-mail.

“First and foremost, absolutely nobody threatened me in any shape or form,” Munaim said yesterday.

Lurie declined to confirm yesterday whether that line of his op-ed refers to Munaim, though Munaim and others on the UC say that it is clear that Munaim’s e-mail from former UC Vice President Michael R. Blickstead ’05 was the point of contention.

“I stand by the accuracy of my op-ed and I maintain that my interpretation of the facts is accurate,” Lurie said.

Munaim said he received an e-mail from Blickstead, containing an endorsement of Capp and the platform he had “co-developed” with Glazer in last term’s election. The e-mail also had an endnote reminding Munaim that he could contact Blickstead if he was still interested in working in finance next summer.

The e-mail, which Blickstead gave to The Crimson, was characterized by a mix of personal and professional comments, but contained no explicit threats to Munaim.

Blickstead, who will be working at Goldman Sachs next year, said that he and Munaim had frequently talked about their shared interest in finance.

“And if you have any questions about full-time recruiting next year, definitely contact me,” he wrote in the e-mail.

“[Munaim] knows me well enough to realize that I was just wanted to be helpful and didn’t think it was necessary to send two separate e-mails, one saying why I thought Clay should be VP and a second one saying that we should keep in touch and that he should contact me about recruiting questions next year,” Blickstead wrote in an e-mail yesterday.

UC President Matthew J. Glazer ’06 wrote a response to Lurie’s piece that he posted to some House open e-mail lists over the weekend. He also wrote an op-ed on the issue that ran in Monday’s Crimson.

“Over the last several days, a number of hurtful and misleading rumors, accusations, and conspiracy theories surrounding the resignation of Nichols and the election of Capp have been floating around campus,” he wrote in the op-ed.

“The council has moved forward—there are very few people who are still talking about those rumors that were being spread and most of them aren’t even on the council,” Glazer said yesterday.

In Monday’s op-ed, Glazer said for the first time that Nichols had been presented with a petition of impeachment before his resignation.

“Ten members of the UC signed a petition of impeachment for Ian Nichols on the grounds that he was not doing the job to which he was elected and the effects of that were hurting the council and the campus,” Glazer wrote. “Ian chose to resign, and did so because, as he said, he did not make the UC his top priority.”

Nichols did not respond to repeated requests for comment yesterday.

Debate about the accuracy of Lurie’s op-ed continued on Cambridge Common, a blog run by Andrew H. Golis ‘06, who was Glazer and Capp’s campaign manager.

In a chain entitled “not QUITE libelous (maybe?),” Golis challenged Lurie’s version of events.

“The idea that Matt or Clay or any of their friends would threaten other people’s jobs or political futures is an outrageous, slanderous and unbased claim,” Golis posted. “I think it’s libel.”

““People who would believe these kinds of rumors and accusations need to calm down and get some perspective,” Golis said yesterday. “It’s the Undergraduate Council, not ‘The Godfather, Part II.’”

Former UC Finance Committee Chair Joshua A. Barro ’05 posted in defense of Lurie’s column, which Golis had called “astoundingly dishonest” on the site. Barro raised the question of why Capp, as a heavily-endorsed member of the UC in December’s elections, had won by such a narrow margin two weeks ago.

“The whole column that Jason wrote doesn’t have to stand or fall as one item,” Barro said yesterday.

Former President Matthew W. Mahan ’05 commented on Cambridge Common that he would have liked to see more competition for the vice-presidential seat in order to engender “more discussion and debate” about the position, even though he specifically endorsed Capp.

“Politics aren’t for the faint of heart, but that doesn’t mean that anyone was treated unfairly or in an underhanded manner,” Mahan wrote.

—Staff writer Liz C. Goodwin can be reached at goodwin@fas.harvard.edu.

—Staff writer Margaret W. Ho can be reached at mwho@fas.harvard.edu.