Monty Ninkovic is one of the candidates for the role of Liberation and Activities Officer in this year’s SU elections. Forge Press sat down with him to discuss his motivations, the importance of the role and his manifesto, as well as his plans for his campaign.
Monty’s main motivations for running for the role is due to finding university “a safe space”, by involving himself in the Student Union “very early on” as the “trans + officer” for the LGBTQ+ society. Monty’s main reason behind his campaign is that he “just wants to give back” to the SU and provide a safe space for all students at university, like he was able to experience.
Monty believes the role of Liberation and Activities officer is important for students as “there are so many things that can be done to improve the student experience”. He wants people to be able to “remember university for the rest of their lives”, and believes “having a bit more representation and accessibility” could “make such a huge difference to the overall experience”. This is Monty’s priority within his campaign and is revealed through the policies within his manifesto.
One of Monty’s priorities within his manifesto is related to learning support plans. He proposes he would work on “expanding the resources that learning support plans offer beyond just students who have a diagnosis”. This would instantly make this resource more accessible to a wider range of students. Monty also believes this would be “easier and cheaper to implement”, so would be one of Monty’s key policies If he did get the role.
Another key area for Monty would be to establish a “society collaboration and networking hub”. This “would make it much easier for societies to collaborate with each other and put on bigger events, whilst getting more funding and engagement”. This would further help establish a closer student community, and help more societies engage with others within a process which would make this “a bit easier for everyone”.
Monty also expresses the importance of the student union to be able to “defend protest rights” and making protests more accessible for everyone. This would include updated information about this in the code of conduct, with an aim to “make sure that everyone is informed and everyone is safe”. This would also involve “challenging the uni’s attempts to stop protests on campus”, and also “fighting against any disciplinary action the uni places on students”.
Monty’s plan for the campaign is to take a “day by day” approach, judging by what “the energy on the campus is like”. This will include “spreading myself out and doing as much as I can in different areas”, and also “having as many conversations and talking to as many people as I can”. Monty also places emphasis on wanting to “get feedback on my ideas for my manifesto”, and the importance of feedback in building his campaign further and also having “a better idea of how people feel” to be able to represent them well, if he were to get the role of liberation and activities officer in this years SU elections.
