NationStates Jolt Archive

The Green Star

Zhaire Citizen Naasir announced today at the National Annual General Meeting a plan to open the Sixth United Republic of Biotopia to the international community. The move comes after mounting pressure from within the Party to speed-up the process of modernisation and lift living standards. The internationalist and moderate factions of the party have been the main force in the shift on policy in a campaign that has been running for the last five years.

The plan has been cautiously accepted by the nationalist faction of the Party which had maintained its resistance to the move throughout the campaign. Spokesperson Wakiuru said “We’re opposed to the complete erosion of our founding policies, we’re satisfied however that this plan will safeguard that base.” Not everyone has been placated by the plan with some senior members of the faction condemning the move in private. The moderate faction has expressed mixed feelings with some members praising the announcement and others reserving their comments until reading the entire policy.

The Gomo Article as the policy has been called will be released after the weekend for public discussion and will contain the following features:

- Opening selected areas of the nation to international tourism
- Establishing permanent foreign representative offices
- The opening of international schools and an international university
- Allowing foreign shipping access to selected harbours
- Increasing export quotas in agriculture, forestry and energy

The intention of the Gomo Article will be to raise national gold reserves to be used in purchasing foreign goods such as medicine, electronics and automobiles. Overall however the government is seeking to accelerate its modernisation program particularly in the communications, metallurgy, and manufacturing sectors. More news will follow but at present most members of the Party will be reading the policy over the weekend before it become public. -14/10/05

Link to the International Gauge of Interest

The Green Star

Overn Harvest Festival has been celebrated across Biotopia with carnivals, community sports and family picnics. The annual Harvest Festival Parade was held in Overn attracting an estimated crowd of 10,000. The parade was headed by a 70 metre long rainbow serpent, symbol of the season. Other mascots included a horse, a goat and a neon-pink pig. The centrepiece of the parade this year was the Overn Children’s League who marched with a variety of birds on poles beneath inflated clouds representing the change of season and return of the migrating bird flocks.

In the national capital [Zhaire] DeGerda Boulevard was lined with flower petals and confetti. A crowd of 8,000 was estimated to have attended and was overseen by the members of the National Executive Council and senior members of the bureaucracy and legislature. Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Citizen Mfaki, was invited to orate to the crowd in a speech later broadcasted to the rest of the nation. He emphasised the need for balance in approaching the modern world, a reflection on announcements made on Friday for plans to open the country to foreign trade.

He also congratulated the honorary Heroes of the Harvest who had been invited to oversee the parade calling them a “living inspiration” and the “embodiment of the national spirit, as it resides in the fields, seaside, mountains and valleys of our country”. National attendance was estimated to be down from the peak of three years ago with many families preferring to attend private picnics and lunch-time meals then engage in the public ceremonies. Ratings for the tabling of harvest production on the BRC remained at a flat-line rate. -16/10/05

Department for National Development - Open, Trade Thread

The Green Star

Editorial The sounds of political upset are once again rumbling from the national capital, this time over the controversial plan being endorsed by Citizen Naasir to begin partially opening the economy to foreign investment. A plan that has been supported by the progressive and reformist factions of the Party and which was initially received with cautious acceptance by the conservative and Republican factions. Things have dramatically changed since the Harvest Festival weekend however.

Forming an anti-reform coalition the Conservative, Republican factions are forming a nucleus of resistance with the Utopian faction having officially joined them this afternoon. Although in negotiations with the Zoonian faction history shows they’re just as likely to abstain on the whole issue preferring to uphold their principles over politics. The reformist camp has been active this weekend too with a special meeting being held at the house of Internationalist faction leader Ade Mahu to organise a counter-balance.

The Internationalists, Progressive Bloc and Club of ’90 are continuing to formalise the deal but are expected to announce their official collaboration on supporting the Gomo Article by Tuesday noon. No doubt the outcome will be the creation of an Unaligned faction, which at this stage is set to consist of the Zoonian faction, by members who will prefer to abstain on the issue. The situation will be a perilous one for Citizen Naasir who has alienated himself from his conservative support base and without their support he is likely to be placed under intense pressure by the progressives to expand the Article – a move which will further isolate him in the government.

Citizen Naasir has proven himself a versatile and pragmatic leader who has previously managed to successfully balance the power of an increasingly polarised government. The situation however might prove too tempting to some from the conservative side of politics including the Conservative faction which has adopted him since he re-emerged from the Unaligned faction over the issue of uranium mining in ’96. The continuing spread of national debate will no doubt see pro and anti activists taking to the streets in what is likely to become one of the big issues of the year and could carry through to the elections scheduled for December.

At this stage however all that is a matter of staring in an obsidian ball. This government has provided the occasional surprise, who could forget the memorable combustion of the Agrarian faction over three weeks of cloak-and-dagger politics, back-door deals and allegations of fraud? Those days seemed behind us as the government fell into the regular routine of point and counter-point but this legislation offers a reignite the more lively start of this terms government. -18/10/05

The Green Star

Saint Kordaam The Congress of Social Organisations has released its third annual report entitled the ‘On the Social Conditions of the Nation’, regarded as one of the most comprehensive and independent reports released on the social state of the country. The Congress is attended by a variety of NGOs that operate at the national, regional and local level and for the past three years now they’ve converged to discuss progress in social reform, lobbying for assistance to minority and disadvantaged groups and co-operating on national projects. The theme of this years Congress was reform with delegates discussing plans to lobby the government in the areas of mental health, juvenile law and punishment and discrimination against sexual minorities.

The report was compiled earlier and distributed to attendees of the Congress. Minister for the Department of Welfare and Social Services, Cheja Omusa received 26 roses on the stage in response to cuts in mental health funding, one of the focuses of this years meeting. The presence of members from the conservative Red Cross charity drew cat calls and jeers from some members of the Congress when they advocated that homosexuality was a “curable disease” through the use of electrotherapy. At its conclusion the President of the Congress, Osam Yoki, concluded by describing the meeting a “success and providing a step in the right direction for serious reform”.

The Report
Income Distribution (***) Income disparity has grown due to economic reform shifting government monopolies into private collective ownership seeing average incomes dropping. Not all wages have fallen and in specialist fields of employment wages have generally risen. The CSO recommends the introduction of a maximum wage system and providing grants to promote entrepreneurship and reduce unemployment.

Literacy (*****) Efforts at improving the educational system have been congratulated as out-standing. Tertiary and technical universities have rapidly expanded and the age of compulsory education lifted to 16. Tertiary enrolment has risen by 62% an outcome praised by the Congress.

Life Expectancy (***) Life expectancy has remained stagnant and there are indications that it may be declining. Providing access to universal healthcare has been praised but the Congress criticised the lack of aged care facilities and the need for better access to basic pharmaceuticals. The Congress recommended that the government direct future spending increases to health and in particular mental health services which were described as “primitive”.

Position of Women (****) Efforts to encourage women to enter higher education, the civil service and in government has been welcomed by the Congress. They noted however that for women in the more rural regions gender discrimination still pursuits but they have been gaining better access to legal aid, women’s refuges and medical assistance.

Freedom (**) The Congress made a damning criticism of refusal by the Party to lift restrictions on external travel and interaction claiming it “stinks of the police state”. Censorship of foreign films, literature and even clothing was also strongly criticised as stifling to the social wellbeing of the community. The report made note of several incidences when the government attempted to silence the free press and rescind the rights of assembly, union and creativity.

Sexual Minorities (***) The situation for sexual minorities has increased significantly with the de-criminalisation of homosexual practice and equalisation of the age of consent. The right to discriminate still pursuits within in most private organisations and there is an environment of harassment even within the civil service. Homosexuals also have an elevated risk of self-harm or death in prison. The Congress supported continuing lobbying for the abolition of the right to officially discriminate and establish a national council on the affairs of sexual minorities.

Politics in Assessment (***) For the third consecutive year the Congress supported replacing the centralised republican model with a federal structure, a call that was buried behind a description the past years listing of major social policies passed in the parliament. The report also recommended granting local council greater self-administration on the basis of improving efficiency.

Economy (**) Economic productivity has increased but so has unemployment as the new “privatised” companies shed excess labour. The government has recently engaged in a modernisation program aiming to export specialised and value-added produce to fund expanding social programs. The Congress predicts that in the long term this will be a favourable outcome for the benefit of increasingly living standards but more practical support needs to be given to those caught out by the transition.

Environment (**)Exhaustion of the soil was causing many families to expand into marginal land or to ultimately move to the cities. Logging had destroyed significant areas of woodland and fresh water environments were being contaminated by mining and industrial effluent. The nuber of environmental groups have increased from the original five of the first meeting to 26 this year reflecting the importance the issue is gaining.

Wikipedia National Entry (http://ns.goobergunch.net/wiki/index.php/Biotopia)

The Green Star

Zhaire Citizen Shujaa has been officially announced as the Secretary of Foreign Affairs. The creation of an official Department of Foreign Affairs, an area of policy usually delegated to the Supreme Chancellor, is part of the controversial Gomo Article which will open the nation to foreign capital and diplomatic relations. Citizen Shujaa from the moderate wing of the Nationalist Faction was believed to have been chosen to placate the Nationalists who have been the leading anti-Gomo campaigners. A former Minister for Agriculture under the Fifth Republic he has a track record of moderate policy and is known for his efficient administration.

Citizen Shujaa will oversee the official opening of Department Headquarters in the prominent Republican Plaza before leaving the nation in the first major diplomatic mission since the establishment of the Fourth Republic. Overseas he will begin negotiating ratification of membership to the Anti-Capitalist Alliance marking a major shift in the official neutrality of the government, although this has been a periodically contested stance. Membership of the ACA is not intended to see a significant change in official government domestic policy and has been described as a “symbolic gesture of international solidarity.”

The government has remained nonchalant on wether or not there were any intentions to join the United Nations since membership was suspended with the fall of the Fifth Republic. It is suspected that the government will use membership of the Anti-Capitalist Alliance to springboard into membership of the International Free Trade Agreement which would provide a massive boon for receiving international capital while preserving the eco-economic system. The Department of Foreign Affairs will employ a mere 200 people but is expected to double in size by the end of the year through an ambitious program of expanding international horizons. -27/10/05