Narikaton and Darnussia

[Mbites]

Heinz Heiss: Ten Years of Blissful Stable Stagnancy

February 5703


President Heinz Heiss

It has been more then ten years since the dreaded Schuhbeck crisis and the subsequent victory of Sztermann (VVP) who has led a conservative-thallerist government for one term before being ousted by his party colleague Heinz Heiss, a centrist who has made overtures to the general public by running of a platform of “no change at all.” Political experts have explained the success of the campaign by showing off how Heiss has connected to the fears of the Triad citizens, which mostly revolve around security. Since the birth of the predecessor of the Triad, the Dual Republic, one of the most emotional issues for the people of the nation was the geopolitical situation and the surrounding ease and security of business; when the Dual Republic had become what it once was, during the fall of the Dorvish hegemony over the Artanian continent, the people were happy to throw in with the great-coalition of VVP and Social Democrats working with any that have offered their hand leading to a generally positive outlook. When we now look back at the 5670s and 80s this ‘reserve optimism’ had been exhausted by the political establishment which eventually led to Heiss’ conservative-centrist faction taking over and allying with the GRP in an attempt to mirror what had happened more than two hundred years ago with the VVP and the SZU (Social Centrist Union). While he succeeded in taking power for two terms the results of this political reactionary dream were mixed.

Domestic

During the VVP-GRP great coalition under Heinz Heiss, the Senate on the initiative of the government have made minor concessions to liberalizing the general drug policy – aside that of Jorgen Island which has autonomy in such cases – and have made several compromise solutions on welfare agendas, mostly using ordoliberal policies. For example, the state is now mandating private insurers to offer a basic package outlined by law to ease the healthcare costs of poorer families. In addition to that, they’ve protected Sztermann constitutional reforms from attacks of the National Union (Far-Right nationalist) and other new political movements. These reforms include the redrawing of electoral Senate districts that have weakened the proportional representation election system to ensure that the two traditionally large parties maintain an upper-hand, which was one of the most controversial topics of the last ten years. Other than that some rollbacks have been made regarding transparency which has been very critically received by the new Liberal Republican Party (a party consisting mostly of former DRP members not associated with Schuhbeck/Kadiyot). Other than that, only public finance comes to mind: Heiss’ conservative-socialdemocratic coalition has actually stuck to an unexpected fiscal-conservatism freeing a lot budgetary resources blocked by Schuhbeck-era mercenary contracts.


Heinrich 'Bigman' Berger

Foreign Policy

One of the most lacking aspects of the Heiss coalition was foreign affairs. The Directorate has seen major budget cuts as the Triad has retreated to some sort of defeatist isolationism, being content with its moderately successful post-3rd Point Federation security architecture for the pass. While the Triad has maintained most of its friendships across the Artanian continent, relations with all other continents have deteriorated due to general inactivity, closing several Directorate outposts or off-site council buildings. Especially the Majatran influence of the Triad has basically been reduced to nothing in the last few years, only Istalia is seen as a trusted partner in the eyes of the Triad public. Meanwhile what remains of the Third-Republic, Himmelshtern, has been reduced to the city and its outskirts which has developed into a fortress with excessive defensive structures and stationed personnel guarding the last Majatran territory of the Triad. Some argued that the stance toward the new Amudim state and the Jelbosphere reeks of paranoia while others don’t know what else to do.


Severin Hegel, Leader of the MTP

Military

The Military of the Triad is still after those ten years dominanted by its immensely strong navy counting more than 150 ships and more in construction. Comparatively the Military had seen the least budgetary restraints in the great coalition, only cutting what was unnecessary when the mercenaries were no longer needed and occupational garrisons were no longer maintained. Heiss confirmed that he remains committed to maintaining the security of Bannerhafen by force if necessary even if the trump-card of Triad projection had always been soft-power and cooperative-think.

What does the future bring?

April 5703 sees us entering election season: Both the Senate and the Presidency are once again up for grabs and the challengers are numerous.
Heiss has - according to insiders - already lost internal power struggles to the de-facto Leader of the VVP, Heinrich ‘Bigman’ Berger. The conservative bigshot would be a unique president as the first holder of the office with Nsanian-migrant background and no formal education; Berger is a selfmade multi-millionaire by speculating and investing on the various financial markets the Triad has access to. He is running on reinvigoration and security by money which basically is the usual VVP recipe for victory. We expect Berger to be designated officially momentarily. On the Left side we have Theodora Hellne, the GRP leader comes with decades of experience on all levels of the executive ultimately serving as Vice-President under Heiss, she’s expected to gather the few remaining enthusiasts of the past “reactionary” government and hardcore leftists as the GRP remains the only party running on left-wing policy platforms. Priorly we’ve already managed the Liberal Republican Party filling the whole left by the Democratic-Republican Party, other minor parties challenging the elections are the two thallerist parties by the rival twins Werner and Warner von Thaller as well as the another new party on the right the “Monarchist Tradition Party” which is running on the single-issue of turning the Triad into a non-Thaller monarchy and also advocating for the persecution of the family.