SU Spring Elections 2026: The Boar speaks with your new Sabbatical Officers
The Dirty Duck was transformed into a sea of green on Friday, 13 March 2026 as a week of campaigning and voting came to an end in the Warwick Students’ Union (SU) 2026 Spring Officer Elections.
For the first time since 2020, the Results Night was held in front of a live audience, made up of the candidates’ campaign teams, pub goers, and student media. The night was certainly an enthusiastic one, full of cheering, clapping… as well as some questionable kazoo accompaniment.
A quarter of the Warwick student population weighed in on this year’s elections, marking the highest turnout in at least over a decade. The number of candidates contesting the election was also up on last year, with 53 hopefuls fighting it out for 13 of the 15 available positions. The only uncontested positions, the Part-Time Officer roles of Trans Students’ Officer and Disabled Students’ Officer, will be re-opened for nominations in the Summer Elections.
The big headline of the night was the election of current VP Welfare & Campaigns, Ollie Chapman, as the next President of Warwick SU. In a four-way race, which included The Tab’s BNOC Alex ‘Funnylord’ Preplita, Chapman comfortably took the victory with a margin of 1,563 votes over runner-up Ilyan Benamor.
Other positions were much more tightly contested, however. Zoë Holloway took the victory in the Women’s Officer election with just two more votes than her closest opponent, Polly Davies.
While students may remain concerned over problems like the cost of living, the ongoing accommodation crisis, and academic concerns, democracy seems to be alive on Warwick campus, and the next set of FTOs and PTOs look set to fight students’ corners on their manifesto pledges.
Here is what they had to say.
Part-Time Officers (PTOs)
Widening Participation Officer – Edden El-Hashahar
Edden El-Hashahar was announced as the first victorious candidate on the night, winning the position of Widening Participation Officer. El-Hashahar was not at the Dirty Duck to make a speech upon her victory.
Environment and Ethics Officer – Marilou Schini Panagiotou
The second result of the night saw Marilou Schini Panagiotou, a first-year PPL student from Cyprus, elected as the SU’s new Environment & Ethics Officer. After walking on stage to her selected song of Glee’s ‘Don’t Stop Believing’, green feather boa around her neck, she paid credit to the five “exceptional” candidates running alongside her, saying she “would love to work with them”. This came after an extremely tight win, just five votes ahead of other joint-ticket candidates Maryam Ahmed and Taran Talbott.
Amid applause, Panagiotou told the crowd in the Dirty Duck that she was “so thrilled to make the University green”, going on to hint that she had a number of ideas she would like to action.
The newly-elected EEO then spoke with The Boar’s Co-News Editor Nikolai Morton. Asked how she was feeling having just been on stage, Panagiotou said that she was “feeling amazing” and that she “can’t believe it”.
Panagiotou – whose campaign featured singing in the Warwick Arts Centre – told The Boar the “campaign was harder than I thought it would be”, but nevertheless expressed the fun she had while doing it.
Closing the interview, she said the first thing she will do in office is “work on the SU website to make biodiversity initiatives more accessible”. Panagiotou, whose manifesto involved the creation of an “eco-map” to inform students about where sustainability resources are on campus, said that initiatives like this would help to make students more aware of “exactly what Warwick does” and will aid sustainability and biodiversity efforts.
Women’s Officer – Zoë Holloway
The Boar was then joined by winning PTO candidate for Women’s Officer, Zoë Holloway, who said in a brief victory speech: “I’m really excited to represent all of the women at Warwick.”
An ecstatic Holloway, who beat second-place candidate Polly Davies by a mere two votes, was enthusiastic about her successful week of campaigning, and told The Boar of her plans to update the mandatory training for society exec members when she takes up the role later this year.
LGBTQUIA+ Officer – Willow Brown
The next PTO to be announced was Willow Brown as the new LGBTQUIA+ Officer. She’ll take over from Jessie Yu and Mattie Oke in the role from the start of the next academic year.
Although Brown was uncontested in the election, she told The Boar that she was “twitchy” and “excited” upon finding out the news of her victory, adding that she had received “more votes than expected”, polling 1,105 votes.
When asked what the first thing she’d like to do in her new role was, Brown said she was “really eager” to campaign for LGBTQUIA+-only student accommodation options on-campus. “I really think that’s important to get sorted”, she told The Boar.
Ethnic Minorities Officer – Zaynab Ul-Haq
Zaynab Ul-Haq was then announced as Warwick SU’s next Ethnic Minorities Officer (EMO), beating Safiya Patel by 13 votes.
Thanking her team’s hard work during the week, Ul-Haq told The Boar: “My campaign team spent all night painting the banners with me, making all the things, which was really nice, especially as it's the last ten days of Ramadan. But they still made time to do it all.”
She mentioned her idea of an “annual feedback report” regarding the role as a starting point for when she becomes the next EMO.
Full-Time Officers (FTOs)
VP Societies – Adam Skrzymowski
The first FTO result saw a strong victory for Adam Skrzymowski, the incumbent VP Societies. It was a particularly competitive race this year, with each candidate campaigning across campus, come wind and rain (of which we’ve had plenty!), racking up over a thousand votes each in the process. He gave The Boar a quick debrief, along with a glimpse into his future plans in the position.
Skrzymowski’s immediate reaction was one of positivity mixed with relief. He said: “To win with such a margin, I’ll be honest, I was expecting it to be a lot closer ... so thanks to everyone who voted for me.” After the STV number-crunching, he cruised to victory with an impressive 2,115 votes.
He said that while “today has been fantastic”, the highlight of campaign week has been “when the sun comes out”, when he was “out and about talking to people in the sunshine”.
Asked about the candidates’ camaraderie on Instagram, Skrzymowski paid tribute to his rivals, saying he’s “sorry only one of us can be elected”. He continued: “It’s been an amazing week so thanks for making it that great atmosphere it’s been – best of luck with whatever you do next.”
What can we look forward to during Skrzymowski’s second year in the job? In what will likely come as music to the ears of cash-strapped students, his first key pledge is to “end the Societies Federation fee”. He said this “would be a massive gamechanger that enables us to do so many more things”.
VP Sports – Nazrana Meghji
For some students, they might have forgotten what it feels like to elect a VP Sports on Election Night, after last year’s unsuccessful campaign by sole candidate Ollie Seal ended up with the re-opening of nominations. However, for Nazrana Meghji, she didn’t have to push aside feelings of exaltation and joy after being elected as Louis Gosling’s successor in the Sports role.
Echoing the words she said immediately after her win on the Duck stage, Meghji told The Boar that winning the position was “such an empowering feeling”. She had previously lost a race to the position when elections were re-opened last summer. “It feels like something I couldn’t feel in the summer, and now I feel it”, the victorious candidate said.
Asked why she thinks her campaign was successful this time around, she talked about how the decision to run wasn’t one she had made “spontaneously”, adding that there “was definitely a level of maturity and commitment" in her campaign, which centred on “access, inclusion, and support” in sport.
While Meghji’s work will begin in August, she has nearly a year to wait for what she said will be the highlight of her VP Sports year: Varsity. “I’m looking forward to being the centre” of the tournament, she remarked, no doubt hoping to oversee a 37th consecutive victory for the teams in red.
Concluding her talk with The Boar, she reiterated her main goal of “giving women, and women of colour, and people of colour a space and voice in sport, especially in a country that doesn’t always feel like ours”. If her predecessor’s words of advice are anything to go by, Meghji’s year will no doubt be driven by getting out there and being “authentic” as Team Warwick ushers in a new era and a new look.
VP Democracy & Development – James Varney
Next up, James Varney was re-elected to the Full-Time Officer position of VP for Democracy & Development in a landslide victory. Before speaking to The Boar, their speech to the lively Dirty Duck audience restated their pledges for “an unapologetically student-led SU that fights your corner on rent, the buses, and for liberation”. He also said: “I’m proud that so far in this election, the students have decisively rejected the divisive politics of Conservative and Reform-backed candidates”, met with significant applause.
Speaking to The Boar, Varney said he was “absolutely over the moon” and “really excited” to be trusted by the student body in a second term. “I think there’s still a lot more that we can do.”
Varney won over 70% of the votes, defeating their lone opposition, postgraduate Anmol Pandey, in the process. “I think I was confident in my record [of achievements in the role so far], and I’m just happy to see that reflected in the final tally.”
Varney also spoke about the wider success of this year’s elections: “There have been some absolutely amazing campaigns run, some really inventive ideas, videos, banners, leaflets … Election week is always great, but it’s especially nice when you’re a candidate.”
Varney is looking forward to working with the new team of Full- and Part-Time Officers to replicate how the current team is “aligned on what issues matter to students and what we’re working on”.
He’s also looking forward to next year’s elections already: “We’ve had a record number of votes [this year], but I do think we can take that even further and I think there’s lots more we can do with the University to really promote voting on campus and to really get people engaged in the SU.”
VP Postgraduates – Ronny Whetton
The role with the most competition was that of VP Postgraduates (VPPG), which was won by an elated Ronny Whetton. Moved to tears in front of the crowd, Whetton described the campaign week as “one of the greatest experiences of [his] life”. His emotional speech suggested how much the win meant to him in a year of personal ups-and-downs, before he left to celebrate with his team.
When speaking to The Boar, Whetton re-emphasised his gratitude for his team: “I’m so thankful for everyone who’s involved [...] everyone just put 110% in”.
He told The Boar that the highlight of the week had been filming the Instagram content, some of which had been done prior to the beginning of the official campaign week, and some as the week went on. Whetton led one of the most visible campaigns of the week, especially against the backdrop of 11 other candidates –making his role the most contested position of the Spring Elections.
After being asked what he would like to achieve first in his position, Whetton focused on his desire to spread awareness about the SU. “Getting postgrads more informed about roles and structures with regards to the SU,” he said, “is the biggest priority.”
He clarified that this applies to all new students, both undergraduate and postgraduate: “I think the SU has a real deficit in terms of the education it provides.”
This lack of awareness means that the “opportunity to get embedded in the SU has the risk of passing you by”, Whetton added. Indeed, only 25% of the student population actually voted in these elections, with 6064 undergraduate voters and only 786 postgraduates.
To improve postgraduate involvement with the SU, and for all students, Whetton expressed his hope to “make the SU clearer in its communications, more direct in what it says, and just more directly representative”.
VP Welfare & Campaigns – Harri Paget
When The Boar caught up with Harri Paget, the next VP Welfare & Campaigns, they were ecstatically lost for words immediately after finding out they had won. Reflecting on the campaign week, they found comfort that their team “did everything we possibly could” whether that resulted in a win or loss, though it “clearly paid off” considering Friday’s results.
The ultimately close vote count was a reflection of the active campaigning, particularly on social media, of all five candidates. When asked why Paget felt they stood out, they said it was because of their “specific policies” which they know they can actually bring to life, from their experience of the Students’ Union as a current Disabled Students’ Officer. Paget also regaled the colour scheme and design choices of their campaign manager, Ruby Deakin, as also helping push them over the line.
Looking to the future, the very first thing they want to enact is mental health first responders on campus, because it will naturally have the longest negotiation and implementation process. Other pledges, like improving the walk to Westwood Campus, are already in motion, which they want to give an “extra push” once in the position officially.
In the ultimate commitment to campus life, Paget worked the Open Day the day after election night, so their alcohol-involved celebrations did keep that 12pm shift in mind.
VP Education – Raj Hacker
In yet another victory for the University’s left, former SU Environment Officer Raj Hacker battered aside four other candidates to ease into the VP Education position with almost as many votes as his opponents put together. Reflecting on a campaign defined by an energetic social media presence, Hacker praised “one of the greatest experiences” of his life. Speaking to The Boar, the winning candidate was full of gratitude for everyone who had supported him, both before and during a hectic campaign week.
There was a rueful pause for the loss of a campaign banner – presumed stolen – for which Hacker took the opportunity to plead its return. Noting the three days spent on it by a friend, he repeated his incredulity at the number of people willing to help out his campaign: “I felt so bad asking, like, ‘Hey, do you want to help? Can you help?’, and people were like, ‘Yeah, of course!’”
Eyeing the “terrifying” prospect of assuming the role in the summer, he affirmed his plans to start reforming Student-Staff Liaison Committees (SSLCs) immediately. “I think there's a lot of work to be done there. And if you get it done before the year starts, I'd like to be able to make sure that the next generation of uni students are better suited and better represented in academic life.”
President – Ollie Chapman
The big result of the night came shortly after 8pm, when current VP Welfare and Campaigns Ollie Chapman was announced as the next SU President, succeeding incumbent Alijah Taha. Chapman’s landslide victory saw him elected in the first stage of voting, his 2,680 votes more than doubling those won by second-place candidate Ilyan Benamor.
The former Chair of Warwick Left sat down with The Boar shortly after his big moment on stage.
“I just want people to know”, he began, “that the trust that you placed in me, I don't underestimate it. I work tirelessly every day to make Warwick a more affordable place, and also just a generally nice experience for students.”
A flushed Chapman thanked his campaign team, adding that “it’s their win too, and also it's the students’ win, because hopefully I'm going to do some good work next year, and I know that's what people will be expecting of me, and I’ll genuinely work tirelessly to do that”.
On stepping up from the role of Welfare & Campaigns, he said he is looking forward to getting “more involved in the day-to-day running of the SU”, and to “making bold students in supporting students, especially financially”. His pledge of a ‘Basic Needs Hub’ already shows this, he noted.
Chapman suggested his prior SU experience and his “numbers on the ground” this week as reasons for his success. Asked if his choice of David Bowie’s ‘Heroes’ as a walkout song was a nod to his campaign team, he smiled. “I suppose in many ways it is, it’s a song that I love and it’s quite a final song”. He pointed to his love for Netflix’s Stranger Things and the British singer’s work as other inspirations.
Having interviewed the above FTO-elects, The Boar asked Chapman how he feels about working alongside them soon.
“I'm delighted. I'm so excited. I've looked at the manifestos over the week, I've seen the leaflets. Everyone seems to be on the same page about supporting students, as I said on stage as well. We've been a really cohesive and collaborative team this year, and we have to follow that through, because the progress that we've made in the SU with the University is only because of that collaboration. And so I think I've got a big job to do early on when we all start, with making our team cohesive, and I'd like to think I'll be able to do that. So let's wait and see, but I don't expect any issues. I think we're going to be a really, really great team.”
Looking ahead to his first months in office, Chapman resoundingly said he will “look to re-establish the SU as the home of student campaigns and activism”, and will ensure that “students know where they can access money to deliver campaigns and projects”.
With thanks to all who contributed to The Boar's 2026 elections coverage, and to Warwick SU for their help and accommodation. Until next year!
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