[Xiomera]

DTNS Newshour is an hour-long recap of news events that broadcasts on DTNS TV at noon, 5 pm and 10pm locally in all IDU countries where the DTNS is allowed to broadcast. The following is an excerpt from the Newshour broadcast on 1/2/2021.

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Lea Landi, newscaster for DTNS: Welcome to Newshour, I am Lea Landi. Two pivotal elections are in the books as the IDU enters 2021.

In an apparent rejection of the current government's handling of the Kaijan insurgency, Slokaisian votes have chosen National Alliance candidate Joseph Chavez over incumbent President Joseph Zhang as the next leader of the Slokais Islands.


(Video of Chavez voting displays)

Zhang had been President of Slokais since 2018, and was respected for economic reforms and boosting the economy, as well as his pro-business stance. However, the renewal of insurgency in Kaijan seems to have doomed his re-election bid. We're here with Joel Trujillo, a professor of political science at the University of West Summersea. Professor Trujillo, welcome to Newshour.

Trujillo: Thanks, Lea, glad to be here.

Landi: So, Professor, what exactly happened in the Slokaisian election?

Trujillo: I think it's clear that the renewal of insurgency yet again in Kaijan, and the Slokaisian government's so-far ineffective response to that insurgency, is what killed President Zhang's chances of re-election. There is really no other identifiable factor that I see to cause such a dramatic shift. But it's clear, at least from where I sit, that the Zhang administration has lost the confidence of the Slokaisian people to handle this matter in Kaijan, or for that matter, the rise of far-right elements such as the New Right in the rest of Slokais, which is as much a danger to Slokais as the Kaijan matter, if not more, in my estimation.


(Video of Zhang voting displays)

Landi: The New Right did see a significant jump in the Slokaisian legislature, but they're still a relatively small presence there compared to the major parties. Are they really that much of a threat?

Trujillo: They are, and people should be worried. They espouse a racist and discriminatory platform, and they seem to be riding the discontent of the Slokaisian people about Kaijan to grow their base. They had the largest jump in the number of seats they hold, mainly at the expense of the Conservatives, who had the biggest drop from 2018. That alone should worry people, and I think it does worry many Slokaisians, who just don't seem to believe that Zhang has the answers to that rise in right-wing populism any more than he did the unrest in Kaijan.


(Image credited to the New Liverpool Daily Newswire appears)

Landi: So what happens next in Slokais?

Trujillo: President-Elect Chavez has his work cut out for him. He will need to find a way to bring the Kaijan insurgency to an end without laying the foundation for just having another uprising a few years down the road, as Slokaisian governments seem to keep doing. It seems apparent to me that the Slokaisian people want an end to the constant cycle of unrest in Kaijan, and are expecting Chavez to deliver on that. But he will also have to do so in a way that brings the Kaijanese into the fold, while also not upsetting other people in Slokais and feeding Spencer's New Right movement. As much as he might loathe doing so, Chavez could do worse than making common cause with the Conservatives to try to fend off the rise of the New Right somehow. The New Right is clearly cannibalizing the Conservatives politically, and as they say, "the enemy of my enemy is my friend," after all. Bear in mind, Chavez has to do all this while also not killing the Slokaisian economy, and he also has to restore confidence both locally and internationally in Slokais. It's a tall order, and I don't envy him the task, frankly.

Landi: Indeed. Now, turning to the Xiomeran elections. The government there seems to have won a sweeping mandate for its leadership. The big gamble by Empress Calhualyana to put her fate, and that of her government, in the hands of the Xiomeran people seems to have paid off for her. But was it really a free and fair election?


(Video of Calhualyana and Toquihu celebrating the election results displays)

Trujillo: Surprisingly, it appears to have gone off in a much more free and fair fashion than anyone expected from a nation as steeped in autocratic tradition as Xiomera. Remember, they've never had a democratic election in their entire 600-year history as a nation - and I don't care what they say, their whole Great Selection thing does not count.

Landi, laughing: Of course. But what did election observers on the ground have to say?

Trujillo: Multiple foreign nations and NGOs sent observers, and they all reported that Xiomeran authorities were surprisingly and unexpectedly cooperative. There were some issues, and some observers did report that they believed the government to be behind some of the protests and disruptions we saw at Unification Party rallies and campaign events. At the very least, the supposedly spontaneous efforts by opponents of the Unification Party to hinder and harass their campaigns do deserve scrutiny. But on the whole, it is really hard to say at that this point that the Xiomeran elections were unfair or manipulated.

Landi: That makes the results of the elections all the more surprising. Less than a year ago, Xiomerans were marching in the streets after the coup that overthrew Yauhmi, demanding her restoration to power. Yesterday, they voted in shocking numbers to completely repudiate her claims and her desires, and those of the upstart Huenyan Federation. How in the world does one explain such a massive shift in less than a year?


(Video of Cozamalotl giving his concession speech appears)

Trujillo: To put it bluntly, these elections, and what led up to them, represent a continuing theme of Yauhmi and her followers. They are great at coming up with visions, and ideas. They could even be called the "good guys," as much as anyone even remotely resembling the term "good" is to be found in the mess in Xiomera or Huenya. But Yauhmi and her side are cataclysmically bad at reading people and understanding timing. Yauhmi sparked the coup in Xiomera in the first place, by totally misreading the readiness of her own people to follow her on the path of reform she wanted to lead them down. Then, when she accepted leadership over the Huenyan Federation, she abdicated the Obsidian Throne. This was seen, by many Xiomerans, as a betrayal of their country and their people, not to mention the sacrifices they had been making for her to return to that throne. Strangely enough, no one on Yauhmi's side seems to get that. Now, in this election, Yauhmi and Cozamalotl, the opposition leader, totally misread their own people again. On the day of the election, Yauhmi made a speech via video to the people in Xiomera, urging them to reject Calhualyana and come back to her. She did it to try to help Cozamalotl, but she probably ruined his slim chances to win. Yauhmi and her side just didn't get a simple fact: the Xiomeran people are angry. They're angry at the war and the economic recession. They're angry at the loss of territory and the loss of prestige that brings. They're angry at the fact that this partition between east and west is likely now to become permanent, and that Xiomera will have to accept it with no recourse. They are, in increasing numbers, viewing the entire war and the peace talks in Jinyu and the likely partition and the loss of their canal as an insult to their nation. And they don't blame Calhualyana for it - they blame Xochiuhue, but now, they also blame Yauhmi for starting the whole chain of events that led Xiomera here.

Landi: Forgive me for saying so, but for people like me on the outside looking in, that makes no sense. Yauhmi and the Huenyans are the ones trying to bring democracy and unity to Huenya, aren't they?

Trujillo: They certainly say so. But look. They aren't even asking Xiomerans if they want what they're selling - this Huenyan Federation. They're telling everyone that Xiomera must join it. For a theoretically rising democracy, that's a pretty authoritarian stance. And as these results demonstrate, no one in Xiomera proper wants to hear it. Calhualyana, Toquihu and the XCP told Xiomerans, "Yauhmi and her new country don't want to offer you a choice - we do. Here's elections. What do you want?" And the Xiomeran people answered, quite resoundingly, that they do not want to be absorbed into some other country, or for their own to end. Xiomerans are an intensely proud people, and quite protective of their sovereignty, and I am still staggered that people like Yauhmi and Cozamalotl, who were part of the Xiomeran system for so long, can't grasp why their ask is so insulting to the Xiomeran people.

Landi: So, in essence, Yauhmi and Cozamalotl and the Unification Party sowed the seeds of their own defeat by misreading everything.

Trujillo: Yes, and also, one cannot discount the masterful efforts by Calhualyana, Toquihu and the XCP to get their own message across. Make no mistake, I am not speaking in admiration for them - they're fascist, imperialist, nationalistic tyrants. But they played to the discontent and anger raging across the Xiomeran electorate like master performers. They sold Xiomerans on an image of their country rising from the ashes of this war, stronger than ever, playing on Xiomerans' desire to be seen as a powerful, independent country beholden to no one. And it worked. I mean, look at these results. Toquihu clobbered Cozamalotl and the other candidate, Xayactochtli - he won almost 63% of the vote. The referendums Calhualyana wanted all passed, even the one that was riskiest, Referendum A. Most painful for Yauhmi and her side, the Xiomerans said pretty decisively that they want Calhualyana to be their Empress now, by passing Referendum C with a significant majority. The XCP dominates the new Imperial Parliament, taking 112 out of 160 seats. And this was all in an election that was actually mostly fair, and open. This was a dominant performance by Calhualyana's side, and a complete fumble by her opponents.

Landi: So....what's next for Xiomera?

Trujillo: The way it looks now, this really cements the worst fears of many. With a pretty decisive mandate from her people, Calhualyana will see no reason to back down. And Yauhmi and the Huenyan side now have little, if any, leverage to demand an outcome other than what the international community is proposing: a permanent partition, and the Xiomeran Empire continuing on. As for Xiomera itself, and its people....I frankly fear that they've been sold a lie by Calhualyana, and that this new Xiomeran government, claiming a mandate, will slowly but surely take steps to ensure they can never be dislodged from power. In the end, the Xiomerans will get the country they asked for and thought they wanted....but buyers' remorse, frankly, can be a bitch. Xiomerans may well learn that in the years to come.

Landi: Well. On that note, thank you, Professor Trujillo, for your great insight.

Trujillo: Thank you for having me on the show.