Brukean Elections 2018 (closed)

[Bruke]

Each of the party leaders are holding press conferences. Foreign journalists should attend and ask any questions they like.

the Liberal Party

the National Party

the Royalist Party

the Social Democratic Party

the Progressive Party

the People's Party of the Republic

[Bruke]

The press conferences are still going on, so feel free to ask the party leaders any question you'd like. As long as its policy related, of course.

[Bruke]

This is your only chance to hear directly from the party leaders before the debate early next year, so take advantage of the opportunity.

[New Doltania]

Prime Minister John leBlanc-Mijan of the Social Democratic and Labour Party endorses Nahum Afewerek and the Social Democrats.

[Bruke]

Nahum Afewerek, leader of the Social Democratic Party, has received his third endorsement from abroad. Prime Minister John leBlanc-Mijan of New Doltania has endorsed him and his party. As leBlanc-Mijan is of a similar political orientation, being a member of the Social Democratic and Labour Party, this is to be expected.

Afewerek thanked the Prime Minister for his support. "Social democracy is an international movement. The fight for social and economic justice truly knows no boundaries. Social democracy in our country must be nurtured and supported by those who have come before us. It is an honor to be endorsed by an internationally recognized champion for this cause, like John leBlanc-Mijan."

[Bruke]

The Health and Environmental Ministries have released a joint report on pollution in the air and water supply. It notes that children born today are more likely to suffer from cognitive and intellectual impairments than children born in the 1990s, a decade in which much of the modern standards for pollution, smog, and other contaminants had only just been introduced.

The Progressives, PPR, and Social Democrats all favor tightening pollution standards, and requiring companies to compensate children, or their families, who have suffered as a result of pollution. Notably, the Royalists also support this approach, arguing that the health of the nation's children outweighs potential damage to economic competitiveness.

The Liberals argue that industry should not be burdened with new regulations. Instead, companies should be encouraged to abide by a voluntary code of conduct to make their products and facilities more environmentally friendly.

The National Party has come up with what many consider the most controversial solution: figuring out how to turn pollutants into usable products for export. Some party members have suggested reprocessing industrial waste to make fertilizer and turning dangerous chemicals into soda.

[Bruke]

Prime Minister Finhas Motuma, a Liberal, has made the unexpected move of calling for new regulations on industry. In a speech to Parliament, the PM said that he was moved to act by stories of struggling children in Wusite County, one of the nation's poorest regions. "We cannot make these dear children suffer needlessly. We must protect them. I am all for freeing the economy from burdensome regulation, but in this case the burden is more than justified. I am all for industry, but I cannot support irresponsible industry that endangers the public."

Many in his party would disagree, and there is talk of a party coup.

The left, by contrast, is ecstatic. The Government won rare praise from Rahel Masresha, leader of the Progressives. "Today we see that the Prime Minister is not as enamored with big business as we has feared. I am glad that I, and the progressive movement, misjudged him. We hope that this change of heart is not temporary, but permanent."

The Royalists, usually pro-business, also had praise for the Prime Minister. Tamru Negasi had this to say when asked by reporters during a campaign stop in Brukeville's Church Street: "I applaud the Prime Minister for taking a necessary step to protect our children. Leadership is not about blindly pursuing ideological goals, but putting the nation first."

The National Party had no comment, still dealing with the fallout of its controversial proposal on the matter.

[Bruke]

Civil service reform has become a hot-button topic after the publication of a tell-all book by a former bureaucrat. It accuses the Civil Service of inefficiency, and being unaccountable even to Parliament. The allegations have shocked the public, who consider the Civil Service a national treasure and one of the few government institutions to be beyond reproach.

This is particularly sensitive for the Royalist Party, whose strongest supporters come from the ranks of the bureaucracy. Royalist Party members are so prevalent there that the public has come to identify it with the Government itself. In the past, this has led to defeat at the polls when the Government is unpopular, even when the party is out of power.

[Bruke]

The Prime Minister has chosen to direct the Ministry of Administration, whose role it is to oversee the Civil Service, to conduct an investigation to see if the allegations are true.

The Royalist Party can breathe a sigh of relief, for now.

[Bruke]

The parties have been debating how to best handle traffic congestion.

The Social Democrats and the PPR favor creating a toll for drivers during peak traffic hours in large cities, then using the money raised from it to expand public transport.

The Royalists favor expanding the existing road network.

The Progressives favor abolishing private motor transport altogether in favor of expanded public transport, with massive investments in buses and subway systems.

The Liberals favor none of the above options, as they all include increased government spending.

[Bruke]

The Prime Minister's decision, with the permission of the President and His Majesty the Ras, to send troops to Diyaristan has come under withering criticism in the past few days.

The Progressives are holding a protest rally outside the Parliament Building, and have vowed to keep up the pressure every day Bruke is involved in the fight against the now-deposed Diyaristani Communist Party.

The Social Democrats are urging a scaling-back of involvement, contributing intelligence data or logistical resources, rather than putting Brukean lives at risk.

The People's Party of the Republic, is, as expected, resolutely opposed to the war, considering it an unjustified act of interference in another nation's internal affairs.

The Nationalists and Royalists, both conservative parties, are strongly supportive of the war, especially since the DCP is suspected to be receiving support from the People's Revolutionary Front.

The Liberals are strongly opposed to any new major conflict abroad, and there has been serious talk of a party coup to replace Motuma.

[Bruke]

With the possibility of war with the Pan-Asiatic States growing ever higher, and the conflict in Diyaristan growing ever more dangerous, the public is flocking to the Royalist Party. The party has been in power, or in the Government, during nearly every major conflict in the nation's history: the Wars of the West, the Outer Region Secessionist Crisis, the Roseland War, and the Anti-Coup War.

Tamru Negasi, the current leader of the Royalist Party, was Security Minister during the Wars of the West, and head of RNIS, the country's intelligence service, during the Outer Region Secessionist Crisis and the Roseland War. He says that his experience makes him uniquely qualified to lead during this time of peril.

"The Royalist Party has led the nation during every major crisis it has had since independence over 150 years ago. I, myself, have served as a decision-maker during many of those most recent events. None of the other party leaders can say such a thing. None! As foreign powers threaten our very lives, I reject the cries of the COWARDLY, who say it is not our place to be involved with the rest of the world. Communists are once again threatening our beloved country. We must stand together and oppose them with all of our strength."

[Bruke]

With the ongoing conflict with the Uzumaki Empire, the Government has decided that holding elections in the midst of a possible invasion would be unwise. So, the elections are suspended until such time the Government is sure that it is safe to resume them.

[Bruke]

Message from the Government:

With the winding down of the war and other conflicts, the Royal Electoral Board has reccomended to the Government that elections be resumed. The Government has accepted this reccomendation, and elections will continue, starting as of this announcement.

[Bruke]

With the end of the Easter break, Parliament is finally back in regular session. With citizens and government officials alike having been evacuated after possible conflicts with the VEXA Corporation and the Uzumaki Empire, respectively, elections were suspended. But with the end of the crisis in Elvectica and the announcement from the Foreign Ministry of peace talks as well as a formal proposal to end the Brukean-Uzumaki War, life seems to be returning to normal.

Along with foreign affairs, domestic affairs have been radically reshaped over these many, many months:

1. Gay marriage has been legalized nationwide.
2. There is a crackdown on corruption in local governments.
3. Obscene art has been made illegal, being listed as pornography under the anti-pornography laws.
4. The death penalty has been introduced as an option for drug trafficking.
5. Anti-cult laws are being strictly enforced after a suspected cult attempted to purchase land in Wusite County.
6. Cannabis has been legalized at the federal level for recreational use, but only for home use.
7. Prisoners can apply to the federal and provincial governments to have their voting rights restored, assuming they have served their sentence and completed parole.
8. The Ministry of Culture's National Review Board now has the power to rate video games, with sales of violent or obscene titles being restricted to adults only.
9. Federal pensions to the elderly have been dramatically increased follwing lobbying from pensioners groups.
10. Military spending has been reduced to fund domestic spending programs and pay for large tax cuts for citizens of all income levels.

All of this has been intiated by the current Government, which was meant to be a caretaker administration meant to finish up the term of the former Prime Minister, Dawit Kelile of the Royalist Party.

The current Government is led by the chairman of the Liberal Party, Finhas Motuma. As PM, Motuma has tried to strike a balance between consolidating his party's base, which is mainly libertarian, with outreach to disaffected left-leaning and right-leaning voters from the other major parties. At first, Motuma struck a more conservative tone, hoping to keep on senior ministers from the Kelile government and peel away voters from the Royalist Party. While this did allow the Liberals to overtake the Social Democrats as the second largest political party in the nation, it came with the cost of turning off left-leaning voters and infuriating the party's base.

Now Motuma has reversed course somewhat, seeking to placate his party's base and regain lost support among moderates from the Social Democratic Party. He has supported legislation that has legalized gay marriage and cannabis and restored voting rights to prisoners. In addition to this, he has signed a budget that would shift funding away from the military and towards domestic programs and tax cuts for all. This has mostly had the reverse effect: Royalists are returning to their party, and disaffected Social Democrats are flocking to the Liberal camp. What will make the difference is if large tax cuts are enough to persuade Royalists of a more business-minded nature to stick with Motuma and his party come election time.

[Bruke]

The Government, after much debate, has chosen to create a toll for drivers during peak traffic hours in large cities, and use the revenue to expand the existing road and rapid transit networks.

The Social Democrats, the PPR and the Royalists are unopposed to the decision, as the policy includes elements of what they all wanted.

The Progressives are somewhat disappointed with the decision, as it did not go far enough in their view.

The Liberals have surprisingly come out in favor of the decision, as they believe it is a fairer way to deal with congestion then increasing general spending on infrastructure.

[Bruke]

Prime Minister Finhas Motuma has swung wildly from position to position in what can only be described as an attempt to appeal to libertarian, progressive, and conservative voters, all at once.

Over the past few months:

1. The PM led the charge against a federal minimum wage law, and it was defeated in Parliament.
2. After a terrorist attack in Dub City by the revived People's Revolutionary Front, postcolonial-era intelligence legislation has been restored, giving the Royal and National Intelligence Agency sweeping surveillance powers.
3. Restrictions have been placed on photographing government officials.
4. Parliament has overturned a ban on solitary confinement for juvenile offenders in federal prisons.
5. The federal voucher programs for food and drink, healthcare, and housing have had their funding restored.
6. The PM has supported legislation that requires full disclosure of the identities of political donors on the federal and provincial levels.

The Royalists support increased security measures, and tough-on-crime policies, but are neutral on the expansion of voucher programs.

The Social Democrats support the expansion of voucher programs, but oppose increased security measures and tough-on-crime policies.

The Progressives oppose everything except the expansion of voucher programs.

The Liberals are split on most of these issues.

[Bruke]

[Bruke]

Commodore was once a city of promise. The government built what would become the Commodore Medical School in 1907 as part of a plan to create a navy. The city, which was founded in that same year and named after Commodore Matias Wendossen, was supposed to be home to soldiers, sailors, and their families.

But as fate would have it, the project of creating a Navy was canceled, due to the expense of creating a shipyard on the Saint John River. Those who had signed up to join the Navy were mostly from poor families, and many had sold all their possessions to be able to afford to move to the city. The men were left destitute, too poor to remain in the city yet too poor to move back to their old homes. They were the ātiset’ihimi, the wanderers- the first generation of what would be the city's underclass.

The sons and daughters of the ātiset’ihimi would grow up to become settlers of the then-colony of Western Section. Through the hardships of war, revolution, famine, and inflation, they kept hope that their lives would get better. Those who stayed behind when the government began the settlement process would join the military and serve during the wars of decolonization: in Western Section and Roseland, in the Hinterlands and the FRR. Returning veterans and expelled settlers went back to Bruke only to find rejection and outright contempt from civilians, who viewed the conflicts and the whole colonial era as unjust. By this time, in the 1980s, Dub City had broken off from Central Province, leaving behind long-neglected Commodore to serve as the capital of the rump province.

Poverty had long shaped the politics of the city, which was a stronghold of the Social Democratic Party, ever since the party's emergence in 1934. The wanderers and their descendants were steadfast in their loyalty to the party, with its focus on providing social services and unemployment relief. But the party's leadership and most of the rank-and-file were from Dub City, and successive provincial governments focused on developing that area rather than Commodore. Years of neglect boiled over in the 1980s, when the city was left facing bankruptcy in the wake of the formation of Metropolitan Province. The Social Democrats of the city split into the more conservative faction, which grudgingly stayed with the party, and the moderate faction, which broke away and joined with moderate Royalists to form the Unity Party.

The Unity Party challenged both the local SD Party, and the local Royalist Party, both of which were more conservative that this new party. Each appealed to their provincial counterparts, who then appealed to the national leaders. Both major parties saw the Unity Party as a threat, and so encouraged their local branches to do whatever it took to defeat them. This led both local parties to conspire in an unofficial electoral alliance against the Unity Party which controlled the city for nearly 40 years. Both would draw electoral boundaries in each other's favor, so that it was difficult for the Unity Party to win seats in local government. In 2005, the electoral alliance was finally exposed when the city's politicans were charged with gerrymandering after drawing up a map that erased the only district in which the Unity Party was prevalent.

This was the final straw. Voters had distrusted both parties for years, and now they were exposed as corrupt. With the demise of the Unity Party and the return of its voters to their respective camps, Commodore became a stronghold for alternative politics: the People's Party of the Republic, long reviled as communists, were accepted here, and the National Party grew in stature with its hardline immigration proposals.

To critics, this city now embraces an unashamedly communist party on the left, and an openly xenophobic and ultranationalist party on the right. Whatever one thinks of these parties, one cannot deny that the politics of exclusion, grievance, and anger are still very much alive here. Distrust of authority runs deep here, woven into the city's history- and its poltics.

[Bruke]

[Bruke]

Wusite County is the heart of the Brukean Bible Belt, which stretches from Brukeville to East Dub. The National Party, with its base of pensioners and veterans of law enforcement and the military, do quite well here with a conservative platform emphasizing law and order, social conservatism, isolationism, protectionism, immigration restriction, and local control. Even though the population is small (a little over 6,000 people), voter registration and turnout is much higher than in the rest of the country, which contributes to a lopsided margin of victory for the Nationalists.

Before the rise of the National Party, Wusite County was an unincorporated area split between Metropolitan Province and Central Province. Just as Commodore once felt ignored by Dub City, the would-be County felt ignored by both provincial governments. Neither part of the area was represented in Parliament or provincial legislatures, instead being put together with Dub City or Commodore.

Left to their own devices, the residents rejected broader Brukean culture, which was comparatively Westernized, in favor of the Ethiopian culture of the original settlers of Bruke. Tribal languages which had long since died out in the rest of the country remained alive here, and most residents are tri-lingual: speaking English, Amharic, and one tribal language like Gurage or Tigrinya.

Residents found work in the military, the Commodore Medical Center, or joined law enforcement in one of the two provinces. The civilian economy centered on logistical matters, with trucking being the largest industry. Generations of locals made their living serving their country in the armed forces, working in the most dangerous hospital in the most dangerous city in the country, driving down perilous mountain roads as truckers, or keeping the streets of Dub City and Commodore safe.

Resentment over constant overseas deployments, human trafficking and gang violence in nearby Commodore, and a lack of support from provincial governments boiled over, with calls for a referendum for the area to unite and form its own local government. This did not become a reality until 2007, when the local branch of the Royalist Party (in both provinces) broke off to form the National Party. Led by Benyam Mekonen, a former Dub City-County Supervisor, the party led a successful campaign for the community of Valley Heights to secede from Metropolitan Province and join the community of Midway in unincorporated Central Province.

11 years later, rising rents in Dub City are driving some to move out to the area. This, in addition to the recent opening of the Valley Heights Observatory Center, may bring an influx of liberal voters to the county's largest settlement, Valley Heights and shift the political demographics in the future. For now Wusite County remains a place set apart, in politics, culture, and other respects.

[Bruke]

Benyam Mekonen, leader of the National Party, is currently attending the International Conference on World Assembly Overreach.

There are several dignitaries in attendance, including Prime Minister James McGuinness of Codd, Citizen Senator Deek Cruonis of UniversalCommons, Varen Kershan, head of the Kashidan Office of Foreign Affairs, and King Edward of Hemlock. Prime Minister McGuinness chaired the meeting.

In a discussion with the World Assembly Ambassador of East Gondwana, Mekonen noted that different nations have different values, cultures and traditions which prevent consensus on issues, mostly social ones. While the ambassador focused on the voluntary nature of the Assembly and that member states have agreed to respect international law, Mekonen argued forcefully that the World Assembly must respect the values, sovereignty, and input of all nations when crafting legislation.

Mekonen followed this up by calling for forming an international body similar to the World Assembly that would respect the sovereignty of its members, and a political group which would serve as a home for skeptics of the Assembly.

It is unclear whether or not this bid for solidarity between himself and other World Assembly critics will have any effect on the election. We'll bring you more updates as they come in.

[Codd]

Greetings, on behalf of the Democratic Republic of Codd, I, Prime Minister James McGuinness, formally endorse Mr. Mekonnen and the National Party in this election. I believe that he will form a strong and steady government, capable of dealing with any issues that he may encounter. He is a true patriot of his country and will do his nation proud.

[Bruke]

Benyam Mekonen, leader of the National Party, has received his third endorsement from abroad. Prime Minister James McGuinness of the Democratic Republic of Codd has endorsed him.

"The Prime Minister's support is much appreciated. McGuinness has shown himself to be a patriot of his own country, and has shown the courage and foresight to bring together like-minded people to oppose the tyrannical World Assembly. Only by standing for the interests of our own nations can we truly make a positive impact on the rest of the world. I trust that the Prime Minister will continue to show leadership on the international stage as a supporter of national sovereignty and traditional values and look forward to working with him in the future. He has shown himself to be a leader among men."

[Hogwarts Pride]

From the office of the Minister of Hogwarts Pride,

The Minister of Hogwarts Pride and his Ministry officially endorse Mr. Mekonnen in the election. We believe Mr. Mekonnen has the right vision and priorities for his nation, I have no doubt, that he will be a strong leader for his country and an example that can be set to follow. We wish him the best of luck in this race and godspeed.

The Minister of Hogwarts Pride