By Maureen Robinson

Time is running out for the University of Adelaide’s Overseas Students Association (OSA), whose chequered history, allegations of mismanagement, and charged tensions with the Adelaide University Union (AUU) may finally signal its end as an advocacy and social group for the University’s 6,000 international students. It is expected that the March 24th meeting of the AUU Board will have seen the OSA disaffiliated from the Adelaide University Union.
According to AUU reports, the OSA has been mired with problems and poor leadership for the last three years. During that time, the OSA – which is an AUU affiliate and received annual funding of approximately $20,000 from the union until its funds were recently embargoed (kept from them unless used for legitimate purposes) – has come under fire for falsifying election results, misuse of funds, and failing to submit reports to the AUU, as well as exhibiting a general weariness for international student representation.
International students, who compose 25% of Australia’s total University enrolment (and a similar percentage of Adelaide’s), have been highlighted by federal and state governments as a source to fill the crucial funding gap in tertiary education. A $15.5 billion industry in Australia, international education brings thousands of students to these shores each year. Many arrive alone and face significant cultural and language barriers, as well as financial, academic, and social hardship. Overseas students’ unions serve as a lifeline to these students, offering them support, advocacy, friendship, representation, and the opportunity to interact meaningfully with domestic students. At the University of Adelaide, the OSA has historically played this role in cooperation with the AUU and the International Student Centre (ISC).
Now, concerns have been raised over the legitimacy of the OSA, whose performance in the last three years can be conservatively described as appalling.

Interviews with campus representatives and an examination of past reports have indicated staggering incompetence and misuse of power by the past three presidents, dating back to 2007.

Documented efforts on the parts of AUU and ISC staffers to promote inclusion of internationals and encourage representation and advocacy for this faction have  been met with hostility, or at best apathy, by the OSA.
Emails and calls are left unanswered. The student lounge sits unused. There is confusion over the identity of the OSA president and how he got there. Frustrations and allegations falling on deaf ears. Caught in the crossfire are 6,000 international students in need of advocacy and support. How did it come to this?

A chequered history
The OSA’s fall from favour began in 2007, when Sri Lankan international student Dilan Moragolle became president of the OSA. According to Lavinia Emmett-Grey, former AUU president and current undergraduate representative on University Council, she was unable to find evidence of an election or any sort of legitimate electoral procedure.
The 2007 elections also saw Moragolle elected to the AUU Board. In one tumultuous meeting in April 2008, he passionately spoke against the SRC having an International Students’ Officer. He saw this as a direct threat to the legitimacy of the OSA, and instead of having this position elected by all students, he wanted a member of the OSA executive to serve as International Student Officer. Most of Board argued otherwise, claiming instead that as Moragolle had for that year budgeted nothing for advocacy, preferring the OSA to fulfill a social role, so it was reasonable for the SRC to advocate on behalf of international students. His suggestion that the position should be filled by the OSA executive had several Board members abstain from the vote, and eventually failed. From this point on, the antagonism between the AUU Board and the OSA only worsened.
In May 2008, the OSA was put on notice from the AUU for failing to submit reports and key performance indicators.  In late 2008, the AUU expressed concerns over certain constitutional changes. The AUU was met with silence from Moragolle when asked to see valid legal documents. Moragolle was re-elected in late 2008 but resigned shortly thereafter on December 24th. He then insisted he had not resigned, then began exhibiting erratic behaviour. According to AUU records, Moragolle behaved in a “highly inappropriate and intimidatory fashion” at an orientation information session for international students, strong-arming his way into showing a presentation displaying “incorrect information, photos of drunk students, [and] shameless self-promotion.” At this point the AUU had defunded the OSA, citing concerns over fraudulent electoral procedures and the lack of reports.
By this point, the OSA had clearly become a problem for the AUU. By scarcely hosting events (by all accounts, only two in 2009) and dodging affiliate responsibilities, the OSA came under close scrutiny from the university community, who became concerned that Adelaide’s international students were not being supported with the advocacy and representation they needed. According to ISC staff, the OSA was virtually invisible at all 2009 events.  Elections in April 2009 – seven months late – resulted in a new president, Pouriya Aryan, being elected – although this election was not without its controversy, as another group of individuals threatened legal action after holding a concurrent AGM and electing a completely different OSA council. Tempers abated for a few months until Multicultural Week in September 2009, when OSA members exhibited attitudes and conduct described in AUU notes as “incredibly disappointing”. A breakdown of cooperation between the groups caused tensions to escalate. Despite outreach efforts to the problematic group by the AUU, the OSA not only left their table empty for the entire week, but also, according to the October 2009 AUU President’s Report, “harass[ed] and denigrate[d] members of the AUU staff rather than participating in a cooperative manner.
According to the ISC, there was no invitation extended to the OSA for the 2010 O’Week events, so low were the expectations of the OSA’s competency. The troubled group has again failed to provide proof of having held elections for the 2010 Executive, with Aaron Leung apparently claiming the Presidency. Details are sketchy, and until the OSA can prove that legitimate electoral procedures took place, the AUU has refused to grant funding to the group.
Lack of communication is cited as the key culprit for the breakdown of relations between the OSA executives and others on campus who are interested in improving the welfare of international students. While interviewing representatives from the AUU and the International Student Centre, this writer heard time and time again complaints about OSA presidents not responding to emails or phone calls, failing to submit regular reports – overall, evading direct questions relating to how the association is being run. Indeed, for this article, neither Aryan, Moragolle, nor Leung responded to requests for comment.
In the meantime, international students continue to receive support and representation from the ISC and AUU, who apparently have shrugged off the OSA and joined forces to provide the vital services needed to integrate international students into the Adelaide community. It’s not as though there are no international students involved in student governance outside of the OSA. A quarter of the AUU Board is comprised of international students, and there is both an International and Ethno-Cultural officer on the Student Representative Council (SRC). Indeed, it seems that no one is missing the OSA, and with the AUU and the ISC picking up the slack, one might ask whether this OSA is worth salvaging.

The National Liaison Committee: An inappropriate bedfellow?
Another area of concern for the university community is the affiliation of the OSA with the National Liaison Committee (NLC), a group of dubious function whose undertakings in the last two years has raised eyebrows across Australia. The NLC, which claims to be the peak representative body for international students, underwent an administrative turnover in May 2008 which drastically changed the functions of the organisation. Less than a year later, in early 2009, the National Union of Students (NUS) officially disaffiliated the NLC, citing concerns over its wayward mandate and lack of internal democracy. Since then, the group has sparked criticism and condemnation from numerous Australian universities. The Campus Review reports that all five Sydney universities had expressed concern about “difficult interactions” with Master Shang, a hard-line Chinese businessman who claims to be the NLC’s public officer. Shang has been accused of “hijacking” the former NLC, harassing university officials with aggressive tactics, threatening legal action against other student organisations, and, according to the Sydney Morning Herald, in 2009 had been thrown out of the office of the director-general of the NSW Department of Education Michael Coutts-Trotter and told not to return, after the meeting had turned sour.
In March 2009, the NLC made contact with the administration of the University of Adelaide, looking for support, but the NUS quickly followed with a warning to all Australian universities that it “did not recognise the NLC as the peak body for international students in Australia.”
“All of us are keeping our distance from the new NLC,” Dennis Murray, director of the International Education Association of Australia, said to the Australian in 2009. Why, then, does the OSA’s constitution mandate affiliation and liaison with the NLC? How does former OSA president Dilan Moragolle’s involvement with the NLC (he was the group’s South Australian convenor while serving as OSA president until April 2008) serve to benefit the international student community at Adelaide? And why won’t Aaron Leung, the alleged president, answer these questions?

Moving —but in what direction?
Staff members from the ISC have made their position clear – they want to support the OSA in any proposed incarnation, so long as international students have advocacy and services. “We would like international students to have really good representation,” said Patricia Anderson, ISC manager. “We’d like them on the [AUU] Board, on the SRC, and to have fair representation across faculty and university committees.  We would like to work with and support whatever the students choose to use… There is a number of different structures that could deliver. It’s not just about the structure but about collaborative behaviour.”
“No bureaucracy is perfect,” chimed in Hedley Reberger, International Student Advisor. “But there does need to be clear and transparent accountability for representation, and for how appointments are made.” So where does the OSA go from here?
One option – which is not altogether different from the current state of affairs – is to scrap the organisation, render it defunct, and hope that the AUU and ISC will continue to collaborate in good faith. Another option is to better support international representatives on the SRC. Ashleigh Lustica, SRC president, agrees.
“From the perspective of a student and the SRC president, I want something that will work and be the voice that international students need,” Lustica said. “I think with the current post-VSU financial climate and affiliate structure, it would be great if the SRC were the umbrella over everything… I’m only seeing that the OSA isn’t working… They haven’t received any funding. No one can find them. Do they actually exist?”
A third option may include a campus-wide information campaign to educate international students about the importance of democratic representation, in the hopes that a new team of responsible candidates will emerge from the woodwork and run for OSA council. Emmanuel Njuguna, former OSA electoral returning officer and AUU Vice-President, agrees it could be an effective measure for reforming the battered association.
“The best would be a functioning OSA,” Njuguna said, also noting the OSA has been run by “personalities” rather than as a functional organisation. “It’s just not being run well. I would prefer a system whereby it knew what it was doing, and had systems to get things done.” He also says that he believes the OSA has had a “fair go” from the AUU in recent years.
Eric Fan Yang, an AUU Board Director and international student, would like the see the OSA remain as an affiliate but with better support from the Union. “There should be better communication coming through, and the AUU should be providing technical and administrative support. Communication has really been an issue. It would be better if there were regular meetings and proper training.”
As the effects of Voluntary Student Unionism continue to force the restructuring of the AUU and its affiliates, constructive changes in international student representation can be incorporated alongside other reforms underway. What remains to be seen is whether the international block will rise to the challenge or let it slip through their grasp, once again.