18-04-2025, 04:15 AM
Tropica Today
Election 5633 - Hung Parliament elected, Unclear who's next PM
June 5633 (backdated) - Well, it’s finally happened. Three years after Dual Member Proportional was chosen as the system to go to the referendum against the current Wasted-AMS system, the referendum was comfortably passed in favour. That happened simultaneously with the 5633 election, where we couldn’t have a tighter race, especially compared to last time. Labour’s shine that nearly won them a majority last time is well and truly gone, and new Tory leader Jack Lewis has been in a tussle for preferred PM with William Tama for most of this year, although his party sits about 2 points behind Labour in the actual vote. Coming into election night, the expectation was that a well-hung parliament would be the result. And well-hung it was. Once the dust settled, the seat counts showed the Tories had 120 seats, Labour 118, the Greens 43, the Democrats 31, Pāʻina Kanakan 28, and Pati Matou 20, with the other parties holding the remaining 40 seats. Referendum-wise, Dual Member Proportional was adopted with a 54% National vote, and received a majority in 23 of the 35 regions, so the redistribution required for the 5638 election under the new system will begin as soon as Parliament returns. Although that could be a while, as electing a Prime Minister is the first act of any session of the National Assembly, there’s no obvious PM with a majority.
Coalition negotiations began the day after the election, and it still looks very messy. At the moment, it looks like Labour have the Greens and the Progressive Socialists in their corner, totalling 169 seats, while the Conservatives have the Tropican National Party and Democratic Alliance in theirs for 139 seats, with the Democrats and 4 ‘ethnic’ parties (Pati Mātou, Pa’ina Kanakan, Pati Teoan Tagata and Raktavan Dal) yet to decide, totalling 92 seats between them.
Lewis and Tama have been clashing for most of the time since the election, and it looks like Tropica may be headed for a political crisis if the five undecided parties remain undecided and the remaining parties can’t elect a consensus candidate as a caretaker PM of sorts in the next few months.