The University of Oxford has announced that 38 candidates are eligible to stand to replace the current outgoing Chancellor Lord Patten. Notably, Imran Khan, the former Prime Minister of Pakistan, does not feature in this list even though he declared his intention to run.
The University has said that all “applications were considered by the Chancellor’s Election Committee solely on the four exclusion criteria set out in the University’s regulations”. These criteria are not being an Oxford student, employee, being a legislative candidate or member. Finally, the 4th criteria is that a candidate has to be a “Fit and Proper person” (a HMRC test to exclude those who wish to “abuse charity tax reliefs”) and cannot be disqualified from being a charity trustee. The University has not publicly commented on why Khan was excluded. However, before Khan’s exclusion, KC Hugh Southey had questioned whether Khan could meet the “fit and proper person test”, while also raising concern about Khan’s active involvement in the PTI. Meanwhile, Sayed Z Bukari (a Pakistani politician close to Imran Khan) posted on X that lawyers have now written to the university asking them to justify their decision.
Of the 38 candidates, 13 are women (34%) while The Oxford Blue believes that from publicly available data 6 candidates (16%) are privately educated and 15 (40%) studied at Oxford at some point. Moreover, 8 candidates (21%) had some connection to politics while at least 14 are ethnic minorities (37%). In the candidate statements, there were some grammar mistakes including the sentence “I have 27 years work experience with different departments and learns from my mistakes.” Moreover, another candidate wrote they wanted to “enhance literacy rate in Uk”. Combined candidates have a wide variety of experience, including the Principal of St Hughs and Somerville, a former university Minister, a former Attorney General and a former Mayor of Bracknell (as well as Lord Mandelson and Lord Hague). Moreover candidates presented a wide variety of reasons for why they should get their job including their frequent Zumba exercises, the fact that any Chancellor will “probably pop off soon”; an activist who claims they hadn’t “invaded any Middle Eastern countries”, or the first openly gay British general. Meanwhile the length of statements definitely varied: including one rather short 20 word statement for why Mr Abrar ul Hassan Shapoo should be Chancellor.
Whoever replaces Lord Patten will only be Chancellor for a maximum of 10 years (after the introduction of tenure limits earlier in the year). Voting will begin on the 3rd week of Michaelmas. A second round of voting (between the top 5 candidates) will occur during the 6th week of Michaelmas on the 18th of November. The winner will be announced the week afterwards, potentially giving one candidate who wrote that Oxford University was “their life” after being rejected by Oxford, the chance to make “their dream” come true.