About My Sources
The majority of the information will have direct links to sources because much of this saga has been well documented and reported on by journalists, often from the student newspaper at TMU, The Eyeopener.
Any statements or opinions presented without a source are my own and you should wonder what knowledge or authority I have to speak on this issue. To keep it short, my name is David and I was briefly a part of the cult in my second year as a student. I quickly became uncomfortable with the things they were asking of me and luckily I had enough people around me that made it possible for me to get out before it was too late.
I have also spoken directly with 10+ people who were in the cult for varying lengths and after they were no longer useful to the leaders they were discarded. I have been the target of death threats, to the level of police involvement, multiple times and I have seen cult leaders intentionally try and push people they didn't like into committing suicide.
Disclaimer
There are some things I cannot disclose because they aren't mine to share, and there are a few things I don't like to repeat in case it inspires a copycat. For the most part however, if something has been left out it is because I'm trying to keep nearly 12 years of story concise and easy to follow.
I promise I am not leaving out details about myself or a friend to avoid criticism or to seem perfect. Just like everyone else, I am not perfect, but this saga is not about the well-meaning people who got caught up in the drama. It is about the inner circle of people leading this cult who solely view every person they interact with as a means to an end and have taken extreme measures to steal thousands of dollars from public money.
If you want to have a debate about if my approach to handling a situation was not the best or that I'm too intense and that makes me hard to work with I'm happy to (and odds are I agree with you) but that isn't the point here. There are plenty of people, one I like and ones I strongly dislike, that I'm leaving out of this entirely because the point is the leaders of the cult behind it all.
The Basics
The shortest explanation of what happened is as follows. In the early 2010s the student union elections saw next to no competition with the same "team" winning every year. This led to a perception that you needed to be part of this exclusive group in order to have any say and in 2015 the first opposition team in years was put together, with help from staff at the university, and they won the election. The majority of people on this team seemed to mean well and did not set out to abuse their power.
After winning, several of the men on the team began to take advantage of the power that came with their roles [source] and worked to consolidate their power in the same way they accused their opponents of doing. The same "team" of people have won the majority of student union elections since 2015 and have been behind all the major scandals.
Every time their power has faltered, for example the two times their team didn't win a majority of the positions in the election, they have used underhand tactics like pulling fire alarms to cancel meetings or issuing death threats until their opponents gave up, in order to get their power back as quickly as possible. Every year they have been in full power they have made changes like firing staff members in charge of financial oversight [source], hired close friends to run elections [source], and in general diminished the reputation of the union so that students were less willing to engage with it. Most of their tactics come straight from the CIA handbook on overthrowing foreign regimes [source] and they have been very effective at it.
The Situation Today
The pandemic made the cult's job that much easier because student involvement dropped in every aspect, especially for the two years virtual learning was the norm. It was during the pandemic when then-President Ali Yousaf (who rose to infamy for moving thousand of student dollars into his personal account in the 6Fest scandal) laid off nearly all the full-time staff claiming there was no work to do during the pandemic. Many of these staff had worked there for years, even decades, and were some of the last barriers to stealing even more money.
In 2022 students had enough and rallied to vote in a majority Independent team of Executives and Board of Directors and that team was able to implement the current version of the TMSU By-Laws that closed so many of the loopholes that the cult had relied on for years. Seeing the success the independent team faced, the cult again dipped their toes into serious crime and worked to orchestrate a scenario where the independent President had to choose between putting her life at risk or getting herself to safety - except the only way to do so was to drive while intoxicated.
The unfortunate reality is several of the independent Executives had serious issues ranging from simple inexperience all the way to overt racism and giant egos. After all the harassment and intimidation coming from the cult, the independent Executives became very jaded and saw all criticism as an attempt from the cult to interfere. All of this was by the cults design; spread so much distrust and bad energy so that no one knows who they can trust. All so they can swoop in for the next election and win back power.
This is why no proper election has been held in years. Students have asked for a long time for "real adults" to be in charge and that's what happened. Around 2023 lawyers took over and now there are two part-time Executive Directors, both with decades of experience managing non-profits in Toronto, leading many of the big decisions. There are still students elected in oversight roles who vote on major issues, but the people functionally "in charge" are these staff. As a fan of democracy this sucks, but given how the democratic process has been manipulated over the last decade its barely accurate to even call what has happened in recent years an "election" anyway.
What Now?
I encourage you to not just take what I say as the truth. Read the sources I've linked or check out some of the ones I've included below. I've also compiled as much evidence from places including news articles, TMU subreddit posts, and screenshots so that anyone who wants to learn more about the students' union history can do so more easily than finding it themselves: Corruption Timeline as well as thoughts I've had over the years for Potential Solutions.