PROFILE
AUTSA's New President
By Ben Webber AUTSA’s new president, Sisifa Lui, practically falls through the door to my office in a flurry of Subway packaging and sweet apologies for not having bought myself and the designer anything to eat. She’s beaming beyond belief, seemingly far too excited to be in our funny little shoebox space and without a skerrick of concern about being interviewed. Within minutes she’s in full swing, talking gleefully about her “crazy” campaign for the AUTSA presidency last year, alongside her friend Mariner Fagaiava-Muller, who’s now the vice-president of the association. She exudes positivity, even though at times the campaign must have been tough, all with their posters being ripped up and NZ Herald articles
accusing the pair of various ghastly and unwarranted things. “A lot of the time we did feel anger in terms of the response we were getting,” she says about the articles. The pair ended up releasing a statement in the midst of all of the negative attention. Sisifa says for herself and Mariner, that period for them was all about being “kind, open and honest” about who they were. I suspect it’s this authenticity that’s got them to where they are now; being positioned as two of AUT’s most influential students. I quickly discover that Sisifa is a real open book as she darts around from one memory to the next, touching briefly, but thoughtfully, on her upbringing in Tonga and a grandmother with whom she shares the same name and who I can tell means a great deal to her.
