| Constitution of the Singapore Microcomputer Society | | | | 1. NAME This Society shall be known as the SINGAPORE MICROCOMPUTER SOCIETY.
2. PLACE OF BUSINESS Its place of business shall be 80 Genting Lane #06-09, Singapore 349565, or such other address as may subsequently be decided upon by the Committee and approved by the Registrar of Societies.
3. OBJECTS The objects of the Society are: a) To develop and encourage by all appropriate means the wider understanding and general use of microcomputers and related systems in new and productive applications
b) To promote in the community the general dissemination of the technology of microprocessors and the skills of personal computing through meetings, demonstrations, seminars and publications
c) To organise such functions as will facilitate these OBJECTS
4. MEMBERS Membership shall be open to all and any number of natural persons who are interested in the OBJECTS of the Society and who being acceptable to the Society, agree to abide by the Society's rules.
A person wishing to join the Society must submit his name to the Secretariat together with those particulars listed on the application form and the current subscription fees as provided for in (5) below.
Members shall be eligible to participate in all of the activities of the Special Interest Groups as provided for in (8) below.
5. SUBSCRIPTIONS The initial and annual subscriptions shall be at rates as recommended by the Management Committee and ratified at an Annual General Meeting or at an Extraordinary General Meeting called for that purpose.
6. MANAGEMENT, GENERAL MEETINGS\MEETINGS Any issue pertaining to the management of the Society shall be voted on in the Annual General Meeting or at an Extraordinary General Meeting called for the purpose, and presided over by the President. In the absence of the President or Vice-President, members present shall elect a chairman among themselves.
The quorum for such a meeting, including the Annual General Meeting, shall be 100. If within 15 minutes from the time appointed for the Meeting a quorum of members is not present, then the members present shall constitute the quorum for the meeting.
However, should there be an objection from the majority of the members then present, the meeting shall be adjourned.
Annual General Meeting: The Society shall hold an Annual General Meeting (AGM) in April of each year. Notice of an AGM, together with the particulars of the agenda, stating clearly the issue to be discussed at the meeting, shall be mailed to all members at least two weeks prior to the date of the meeting.
The following items shall be included in the agenda of the AGM:-
-Confirmation of the Minutes of the previous AGM;
-Acceptance of the President's Report of the Society's activities since the previous AGM;
-Acceptance of the Audited Accounts for the previous year.
-Election of Officers and other members of the Management Committee;
-Election of Auditors.
Any member who wishes to place an item on the agenda of a general meeting may do so provided he gives notice to the Hon Secretary one week before the meeting is due to be held.
Extraordinary General Meeting. An Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) may be called at any time by the President, or in his absence the Vice-President or Hon Secretary or Hon Treasurer, in that order, whenever the Management Committee shall deem it necessary, or on the request in writing of 10 or more members.
Notice of an EGM, together with the particulars of the agenda, shall be mailed to all members at least one week prior to the date of the meeting.
7. MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE A Committee shall be elected by the members and shall consist of the following officers and other individuals:
Officers: President, Vice-President, Hon. Secretary, Hon. Treasurer.
Other individuals: Chairmen of all User Groups and chairmen of all Standing Committees
All individuals chosen to fill the above positions, whether Officers or Chairmen of User Groups or Committees shall be residents of Singapore whether by virtue of being citizens or Permanent Residents, or by holding a valid work/employment or dependent's pass.
Names for the above offices shall be proposed and seconded at the annual general meeting and election will follow on a simple majority vote of the members.
All officers except the Hon. Treasurer may be re-elected year after year. The Hon. Treasurer may be re-elected for only one additional term of office. Furthermore, to be eligible to be elected as President, a member shall have served on the Management Committee for a period of at least one year.
In addition to the abovementioned officers and other individuals, the Committee may co-opt additional members in whatever number is deemed necessary to support the operations of the Committee and of the Society; and these members shall be full voting members of the Committee. The tenure of such co-opted members is limited to the tenure of the Committee which co-opted them.
A Committee meeting shall be held at least once every 2 months after 4 days notice to committee members. The President may call a committee meeting at any time by giving 4 days notice. At least one half of the Committee members must be present for its proceedings to be valid.
Other persons may be invited to attend Management Committee meetings as observers, whether sporadically or on an on-going basis, at the discretion of the committee, with the under-standing that such temporary representative have no vote on Committee resolutions.
The duty of the Committee is to organise and supervise the daily activities of the society and to make decisions on matters affecting its running when the general meeting is not sitting. It may not act contrary to the expressed wishes of the general meeting without prior reference to it and always remains subordinate to the general meeting.
The Committee has power to authorise the expenditure of monies from the Society's funds to meet current operating expenses, in accordance with the approved operating budget. However expenditures on items of capital equipment in excess of $3,000 must be submitted to the approval of the membership at the General Meeting.
Should the Committee decide that any one of the above-mentioned Committee members is guilty of conduct which makes it desirable that he no longer be a member of the committee, the Committee has the right to remove the member in question from office by simple majority vote, following which an alternate individual shall be appointed by the Committee to fill the vacant post until the next Annual General Meeting.
OFFICE-BEARERS
The duties of the officers are as follows:-
a) The President shall act as chairman at all general and committee meetings. He shall also represent the Society in its dealings with outside persons.
b) The Vice-President shall deputise for the President in the latter's absence.
c)The Hon Secretary shall keep all records, except financial, of the Society and shall be responsible for their correctness. He will keep minutes of all general and committee meetings.
d) The Hon Treasurer shall keep all funds and collect and disburse all monies on behalf of the Society and shall keep an account of all monetary transactions and shall be responsible for their correctness. He is authorised to expend up to $300 per month for petty expenses on behalf of the Society. He will not keep more than $300 in the form of cash, and money in excess of this will be deposited in a bank to be named by the committee, Cheques etc for withdrawals from the banks shall be signed by any two of the four officers of the Society.
e) Any member of the Committee absenting himself from three meetings consecutively without satisfactory explanation shall be deemed to have withdrawn from the Committee, and a successor may be co-opted by the Committee to serve until the next Annual General Meeting.
8. SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS Special Interest Groups, also referred to as User Groups, shall be set up within the Society as and when recommended by the Management Committee in response to apparent need. By the same token, such Groups can be disbanded by the Committee when it becomes apparent that they are no longer serving a significant need of the membership.
These groups shall in effect operate as sub-committees of the Management Committee. They will be authorized to conduct separate meetings as and when they see fit, to meet the needs of those members of the Society who share the specialised interest. Such User Group meetings will be open to the General Public, but a door fee will be levied of such fee to be determined from time to time by the Management Committee.
Upon initial inauguration of a User Group, the Management Committee shall designate an individual to be Chairman of that Group, This Chairman shall take responsibility for forming a sub-committee to manage the affairs of the User Group, and shall be responsible for keeping the Management Committee informed of the activities of his Group.This Chairman shall also become a member of the Management Committee.
At such time as the Chairman may resign from his post, the Management Committee will designate an individual recommended by the user group to take over the post, such assignment to be effective until the next Annual General Meeting. Also, as provided for in (7) above, the Committee has the authority to replace a User Group Chairman with another individual if deemed desirable by majority vote.
9. FINANCE Proper Books of Accounts shall be kept in accordance with professionally acceptable accounting practices. The Management Committee shall arrange for the preparation of a Balance Sheet showing the Society's financial position as at the 31st December of each year, together with the Income and Expenditure Account for the year ending on that date. Two auditors shall be elected at the AGM. The auditors shall certify as to the correctness of the Society's accounts. Certified audited copies of the Accounts shall be circulated with the agenda and notice of the Annual General Meeting.
10. TRUSTEES If the Society at any time acquires any immovable property, such property shall be vested in Trustees subject to a declaration of trust. Any Trustee may at any time resign his trusteeship. If a Trustee dies or becomes a lunatic or of unsound mind or moves permanently or is absent from the Republic of Singapore for a period of one year, he shall be deemed to have resigned his trusteeship. If a trustee is guilty of misconduct of such a kind as to render it undesirable that he continue as a Trustee, a General Meeting may remove him from his trusteeship. Vacancies in the trusteeship may be filled at a General Meeting, but the number shall not be greater than five or less than two. Notice of any proposal to remove a Trustee from his trusteeship or to appoint a new Trustee to fill a vacancy must be given by affixing in the premises of the Society a document containing such proposal at least two weeks before the meeting at which the proposal is to be discussed. The result of such meeting shall then be notified to the Registrar of Societies.
11. VISITORS AND GUESTS Residents of Singapore may be admitted into the premises of the Society but they shall not be admitted to the privileges of the Society nor shall they be admitted into the premises more than six times in any year.These visits are to be confined to not more than once in 14 days.
A Visitor's Book shall be kept, in which shall be entered the names of all visitors and guests, together with the signatures of the members nominating them and the dates of their visits. No person shall be a visitor or guest until his name has been entered into this book.
12. PROHIBITIONS a) Gambling of any kind such as the playing of paikow or mahjong, whether for stakes or not, is forbidden on the Society's premises. The introduction of materials for gambling or opium smoking and of bad characters into the premises is prohibited.
b) The funds of the Society shall not be used to pay the fines of members who have been convicted in Court.
c) The Society shall not attempt to restrict or in any manner interfere with trade or prices or engage in any Trade Union activity as defined in any written law relating to trade unions for the time being in force in Singapore.
d) The Society shall not hold any lottery, whether confined to its members or not, in the name of the Society or its office-bearers, Committee or members.
e) The Society shall not indulge in any political activity or allow its funds and/or premises to be used for political purposes.
13.AMENDMENT TO RULES No alterations or additions to these Rules shall be made except at a general meeting, and they shall not come into force without the prior sanction of the Registrar of Societies.
14. INTERPRETATION In the event of any question or matter arising out of any point which is not expressly provided for in the Rules, the Committee shall have power to use their own discretion.
Where a general consensus on any point brought up for decision is not immediately obvious, such issue shall be put to a vote and resolved by a simple majority vote of the voting members of the Committee. However, the President reserves the right to override the vote of the Committee and put the matter to a vote of the general membership at an Extraordinary General Meeting called for the purpose if he disagrees with the majority vote of the Committee members and feels that the issue is of sufficient importance to solicit the view of the Society members at large.
15. DISSOLUTION a) The Society shall not be dissolved, except with the consent of not less than 3/5 of the members of the Society for the time being resident in Singapore expressed, either in person or by proxy, at a general meeting convened for the purpose.
b) In the event of the Society being dissolved as provided above, all debts and liabilities legally incurred on behalf of the Society shall be fully discharged, and the remaining funds will be divided and distributed equally amongst the then financial members of the Society.
c) Notice of dissolution shall be given within 7 days of the dissolution to the Registrar of Societies.
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