Amadjiah
02-03-2009, 17:06
"Good morning NationStates, this is Bannock Martin with INN, the most reliable news source around. A couple of years ago we last heard from the radical Islamist dictatorship of Amadjiah -- General Abdul Bair Hassan ben Naggoroth had just launched a military coup and deposed the Emirs who had been ruling the area for hundreds of years, and had given the nation's non-Muslim population an ultimatum: convert or leave. Last week we revisited Amadjiah to find out what the conditions had been like since that infamous decree was signed into law. And found an even more deplorable situation. We now go to Marisa Tiorati in Amadipolis."
A few seconds of vaguely middle-eastern-sounding music were inserted here, apparently because INN had no idea what Amadji musical traditions were actually like (or suspected viewers wouldn't believe them if they did use genuine Amadji music).
"Thank you, Bannock. I'm here in Amadipolis. And for a nation whose GDP has grown exponentially over the last few years, thanks to the influx of oil money -- estimates place it at over eighteen trillion dollars -- it still looks poorer than ever. The city is immensely crowded and filthy, choked with smog and dust, and sometimes four or five families to a house. And these are not small families, either. A blanket ban on contraceptives and a high infant mortality rate have led some parents to have ten, fifteen, twenty children."
The camera cuts to a middle-aged woman -- with the somewhat darker skin and east Asian features of the indigenous Amadjis, rather than the colonizing Arabs. She speaks in somewhat broken English. "Everywhere, people are very poor. Sometimes they do not have money for food or clothing. The buildings and roads are falling apart, they cannot support the families that are using them."
Marisa Tiorati returns: "I'm speaking with Fatima Drajzan, a journalist and commentator for the Amadipolis Star."
"Order, it is maintained by the army. The army is above the law. It can do what it likes and faces no consequences, not even a reprimand. Yet people support the army, why? Because their sons, those who cannot get jobs, they join the army. Or they become criminals and drug-runners. For there is nowhere else to go."
"Fatima, is crime a real problem in Amadjiah?"
"Oh yes. There are many who smuggle weapons, electronics, oil; even slaves. Some neighborhoods in the big cities are run by gangs, who fight warfare over their turf; the gunshots can be heard at night in many parts of the city. But the worst is the drug-runners. There are many unemployed people, and even those who do have jobs, many of the jobs are very difficult and dangerous: they work in mining, in nuclear plants, with heavy machinery. So they turn to drugs. Drug-running is such a big problem that General Naggoroth has made it legal! He says that way it can be regulated better. But the illegal ones still do it, they don't care, and the army buys from them too so they will always continue."
"But what about all the wealth coming into Amadjiah, from the oil magnates? Doesn't a lot of that go to the government to improve conditions?"
"No! The wealth goes to the General and a few of his friends and cronies. And if you go to the wealthy part of Amadipolis you will see none of what you see here -- there are tall skyscrapers, buildings of glass and steel, military police keeping order. That is the part where the rich people live, the oil sheikhs and their families, the middle-class ones who supported the General. Even for those who do make money the taxes are very high -- sometimes as high as eighty per cent if your tax inspector does not like you -- and the money goes only to fund the General's armies and not the necessary repair projects and urban renewal."
"I've been talking to Fatima Drajzan, an Amadji journalist, about the terrible conditions of life in her home country. From Amadipolis, I'm Marisa Tiorati."
"Thank you, Marisa. We can only hope some benevolent foreign power decides to step in to end these breaches of human rights. Speaking of human rights, the ultimatum delivered to Strator by the Protectorate of Lyras and its allies expires in...."
A few seconds of vaguely middle-eastern-sounding music were inserted here, apparently because INN had no idea what Amadji musical traditions were actually like (or suspected viewers wouldn't believe them if they did use genuine Amadji music).
"Thank you, Bannock. I'm here in Amadipolis. And for a nation whose GDP has grown exponentially over the last few years, thanks to the influx of oil money -- estimates place it at over eighteen trillion dollars -- it still looks poorer than ever. The city is immensely crowded and filthy, choked with smog and dust, and sometimes four or five families to a house. And these are not small families, either. A blanket ban on contraceptives and a high infant mortality rate have led some parents to have ten, fifteen, twenty children."
The camera cuts to a middle-aged woman -- with the somewhat darker skin and east Asian features of the indigenous Amadjis, rather than the colonizing Arabs. She speaks in somewhat broken English. "Everywhere, people are very poor. Sometimes they do not have money for food or clothing. The buildings and roads are falling apart, they cannot support the families that are using them."
Marisa Tiorati returns: "I'm speaking with Fatima Drajzan, a journalist and commentator for the Amadipolis Star."
"Order, it is maintained by the army. The army is above the law. It can do what it likes and faces no consequences, not even a reprimand. Yet people support the army, why? Because their sons, those who cannot get jobs, they join the army. Or they become criminals and drug-runners. For there is nowhere else to go."
"Fatima, is crime a real problem in Amadjiah?"
"Oh yes. There are many who smuggle weapons, electronics, oil; even slaves. Some neighborhoods in the big cities are run by gangs, who fight warfare over their turf; the gunshots can be heard at night in many parts of the city. But the worst is the drug-runners. There are many unemployed people, and even those who do have jobs, many of the jobs are very difficult and dangerous: they work in mining, in nuclear plants, with heavy machinery. So they turn to drugs. Drug-running is such a big problem that General Naggoroth has made it legal! He says that way it can be regulated better. But the illegal ones still do it, they don't care, and the army buys from them too so they will always continue."
"But what about all the wealth coming into Amadjiah, from the oil magnates? Doesn't a lot of that go to the government to improve conditions?"
"No! The wealth goes to the General and a few of his friends and cronies. And if you go to the wealthy part of Amadipolis you will see none of what you see here -- there are tall skyscrapers, buildings of glass and steel, military police keeping order. That is the part where the rich people live, the oil sheikhs and their families, the middle-class ones who supported the General. Even for those who do make money the taxes are very high -- sometimes as high as eighty per cent if your tax inspector does not like you -- and the money goes only to fund the General's armies and not the necessary repair projects and urban renewal."
"I've been talking to Fatima Drajzan, an Amadji journalist, about the terrible conditions of life in her home country. From Amadipolis, I'm Marisa Tiorati."
"Thank you, Marisa. We can only hope some benevolent foreign power decides to step in to end these breaches of human rights. Speaking of human rights, the ultimatum delivered to Strator by the Protectorate of Lyras and its allies expires in...."