ASU filed to impeach ISU president Phally Chroy Monday evening after he made allegations against the organization in an appeal he made against a first impeachment attempt.
Phally Chroy, president of the International Student Union, walked out of the organization’s general board meeting Monday after more students asked for his impeachment.
The African Student Union filed to impeach Chroy at last night’s meeting and a disciplinary committee to consider allegations against him was established. Earlier this month, a member of ISU called for his impeachment. Chroy was impeached, won an appeal and was reinstated.
Ohio University’s ISU is an umbrella organization for 23 international organizations on campus. The executives in the union aim to serve the international community and promote cultural understanding between international and American students on campus.
ASU filed the impeachment in response to Chroy’s portrayal of the organization in his appeal, citing rude correspondence and publicly defaming the credibility and reputation of an organization.
“The president of ISU publicly accused ASU of engaging in bribery and corruption without evidence,” said Toluwani Adekunle, president of ASU and a second-year graduate student in international studies.
Adekunle said Chroy “failed to take appropriate actions” with his corruption allegations of ASU.
“Corruption is illegal in the U.S. It’s a felony, and Phally refusing to make further comments about these allegations is not accepted,” Adekunle said. “As the president of ISU, he has a responsibility to answer his allegations, and provide evidence for the allegations he has made.”
Chroy has claimed that ASU demanded $12,000 this academic year.
Adekunle refutes that claim and says ASU only asked for funding for three different events, which totaled about $8,700.
ASU also responded to Chroy’s insinuation of the organization’s attempt of bribery.
“Phally insinuated that African Student Union attempted to take bribe money in the amount of $250 from an ISU executive board member,” Adekunle said. “These allegations, as far as ASU is concerned, are false. ASU never demanded $250 from ISU, and has no knowledge whatsoever of such dealings.”
Chroy said he is unwilling to listen to rebuttals for the accusations he made before leaving the meeting.
“I was asked at the last exec meeting to sit down and hear grievances about the corruption charges that were put against ISU,” Chroy said. “And I want to say I refuse to listen to it, because it doesn’t relate to ISU at the moment. I told them I would walk out. I will let the (general board) know, that I will not sit and listen to grievances because that impeachment process is already over.”
ASU is not the only organization to take issue with Chroy’s management of ISU’s budget.
Last fall, Ohio Global Studies Union removed itself from ISU because they were unable to cooperate with him.
Kathleen Ott, president of OGSU and a senior studying global studies and Spanish, said the new officers of OGSU were “completely attacked (for) the budget we submitted.”
They were denied the money because of the organization’s non-international status. The budget was, however, later approved for a lesser amount.
“According to ISU leadership, we are not international students, therefore we do not have a place in ISU, which is completely false,” Ott said. “We’re still involved in these different communities and we can be a liaison between the two. Which is … not really a strong link at this point.”
Ott said OGSU was unhappy to leave ISU, but doesn’t intend returning while Chroy is president.
“The fact that he’s been reinstated on a technicality and his ability to stand on a soapbox and be political when in fact he doesn’t understand his role as a president,” Ott said. “He thinks he’s a monarch. He doesn’t understand his responsibilities.”
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