U of O Watch mission, in the words of Foucault...

"One knows … that the university and in a general way, all teaching systems, which appear simply to disseminate knowledge, are made to maintain a certain social class in power; and to exclude the instruments of power of another social class. … It seems to me that the real political task in a society such as ours is to criticise the workings of institutions, which appear to be both neutral and independent; to criticise and attack them in such a manner that the political violence which has always exercised itself obscurely through them will be unmasked, so that one can fight against them." -- Foucault, debating Chomsky, 1971.

U of O Watch mission, in the words of Socrates...

"An education obtained with money is worse than no education at all." -- Socrates

video of president allan rock at work

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

'Canada's university' spied on Burmese students to 'protect' Desmarais


THIS stunning media report from Burma exposes a second known University of Ottawa campaign of covert surveillance that the Rock administration is covering up.

The original Burmese report is HERE. Detailed revelations directly implicate several top U of O executives and are supported by hard-fought-for documents* obtained through access to information law.

University executives conspired
  • to covertly spy on a student event about Burmese blood money allegedly having been received from corporate donor Paul Desmarais in funding the university's Desmarais building,
  • to gather information in view of libel lawsuits against the students, and
  • to increase room booking rates to make rooms inaccessible to unfunded student groups.

For example, U of O Vice-President Victor Simon is quoted from one of his emails as:
"we should prohibit the use of our facilities for this event, on the grounds that the program material includes allegations and accusations that may be libellous . . .I know that this kind of action thinking flies in the face of many principles we hold dear in the University world, but I think we have others interests at stake here."
Others interests (sic)? These guys know who they work for... They have a legal responsibility to protect academic freedom; a responsibility reaffirmed by the Supreme Court of Canada. This is how they do it.

Will the Rock administration continue to bury this kind of malfeasance (e.g., HERE) or will it straighten the ship and do the necessary to restore public confidence in the institution?

*Access to information documents made public HERE, HERE, and HERE.

1 comment:

Big Red Magnum said...

Desmarais, why does that name always come up when sleazy unconstitutional actions are found out?
Oh Right they OWN the Liberal party and are the architects of our socialist corporate welfare schemes, and the biggest winners in the money for nothing lottery when Libs sit in power(corp).