Political: Donovia

Donovia is nominally a republic, but in reality operates as an authoritarian state. Despite outward moves toward democracy, the small political/economic elite maintain power through control of the dominant political party, the Unionist Democratic Party (UD). The UD, in turn, dominates the political and economic landscapes. Despite a tumultuous past, the Donovian political structure remains generally stable. The Unionist Democratic Party arose from the aftermath of the Four Traitors incident in 1991, with a mandate to clean up the corruption within Donovia that had collapsed the nation and arrested nearly 70 years of Donovian power and development. While the  UD has managed to put the Donovian economy on a sounder footing and has been able to increase national prestige through assertive military and diplomatic maneuver, it has done so via highly- centralizing state political control. It has also attempted to centralize political control while  retaining the veneer of democracy and an economic free market. Massive corruption exists despite the  high  level of  integration  between the  UD  and the  government.  While this  corruption was tolerated by the majority of the population as the economy rebounded and international prestige increased, overall tolerance for corruption is starting to lessen.

Centers of Political Power

Real power within Donovia rests with a small group of elites. These elites distribute political power in a self-dealing fashion, using their political sway to ensure the success of economic allies, and using the proceeds of economic dealings to reinforce their political position through patronage and corruption. These elites arose from the elements of the law enforcement, military, and intelligence communities that immediately coalesced to contain the damage of the Four Traitors and the resultant decline of the Donovian state.

The collapse was precipitated by discovery of a massive embezzlement scheme perpetrated against the Donovian government by four very high-level individuals: a politician, Yassar Akbari; a military commander, Ibrahim al-Fatem; an organized crime boss, Ismail Jinat; and an industrial leader, Viaprom  CFO  Muhammad Hafiz.  These  four men  embezzled  huge amounts of cash from the Donovian government over a period of several years, and fled the country when other government officials discovered their malfeasance. The Donovian government refers to both the group of men and the incident as the “Four Traitors.”

The Donovian government responded with the selection of a group of three men who now serve as  the core of the elite that governs Donovia. Granted wide-ranging legal and political powers to root  out graft and corruption in the wake of the Four Traitors outrage, the three men rapidly became allies and a force unto themselves in Donovian politics. The first, Abdul Batin Muhammad, was a colonel in the military, renowned for his bravery and as a widely-published international relations academic. The second, Naaqid Tarraz Tabiah, was a longtime member of the intelligence services  who focused on international organized crime and drug trafficking. The third, Sabiq Noordin, was a former prosecutor and functionary in the diplomatic service. The three still control the Donovian elite. Abdul Muhammad is in control of the UD and has served as defense minister, while Tabiah controls the intelligence apparatus. Noordin is highly engaged in selecting members of the bureaucracy, and controls and appoints most non-defense and non-intelligence related posts.

The current president of Donovia is Jahangir Jaheer, who while famed as a very handsome man, is reputed to be somewhat dim-witted. Jaheer previously served in a number of diplomatic posts, thus he has little in the way of a domestic political constituency.

Military Authority

The military is loyal to the political leadership and generally prides itself on its professionalism. The UD is wary of the military as possibly the only force in Donovia capable of ousting the existing civilian leadership, and is quick to buy off influential elements of the military with weapons outlays and post-military civilian employment to ensure continued loyalty. Additionally, the Donovian officer corps generally supports the UD’s military and international policy that stresses Donovian independence and power.

Religious/Clerical Authority

Like the military, the UD also co-opted religious authority within Donovia, generally favoring religious leaders who support the UD, or at the very least do not challenge its authority. The nation, while officially secularized, continues to receive complaints from non-Arabs and non-Hanafi Muslims regarding discrimination against minority religious adherents. Donovian governmental authorities generally ignore any discrimination claims. The government often uses non-profit social and religious organizations as fronts to limit the authority and actions of religious authorities that are not supportive of the current political power structure. For example, the government will fund an ostensibly private organization and entrust it with the role of approving applications for new mosques, thus allowing the government to claim non-interference in religious matters while preventing the spread of views contrary to its goals.

Attitude Toward the US

Donovia wishes to view itself as independent of the US, and sees its power and culture as equal to or superior to that of the US. Therefore, Donovians tend to view with disdain any attempt by the US to appear to dictate terms of international engagement or of Donovian policies. This requirement to appear to have the last word politically is most notable in Donovian engagement with its immediate regional neighbors.

Attitude Toward US Trade

Donovia generally views US trade positively as the trade relationship may serve as a means to generate leverage over the US in other matters. Donovia maintains a generally mercantilist trade policy, where trade goals are closely linked with political/diplomatic goals with an eye to advancing the combined economic and political interests of Donovia.

Type of Government

The Donovian government, on paper, is constructed in a way familiar to Western observers. The executive branch contains a popularly elected president, who in turn appoints the judiciary. The bicameral legislature possesses the right to review judiciary appointments like judges and national prosecutors, and maintains the power of the purse to determine and approve government spending. In reality, the Donovian government’s representative template serves as a public façade for a greatly incestuous single-party state. Overall, the Donovian government operates in a highly centralized manner, with little in the way of federal structures or local governance familiar to Western observers. Even at the most local levels, bureaucrats and officials are federal appointees, often not even from the areas they are assigned to serve. This ensures that the government operates in a top- down fashion and that independent elements of political power do not form.

Branches of Government

Legislative Authority

Donovia maintains a bi-cameral legislature with an Upper House of 150 deputies and a Lower House of 300 deputies. Elections for both houses occur every four years, with direct proportional representation. In the case of ties, the president can cast the tie-breaking vote. In practice, the legislature’s independence does not exist as almost all deputies consist of party loyalists or functionaries. The few independent legislators possess almost no legislative power such as to propose or block legislation or investigate government malfeasance.

Executive Authority

The constitution and political practice of Donovia ensures an almost dictatorial level of power in the executive branch. Presidents can only serve two consecutive terms of six years, but after a six-year hiatus, a former president can run again. The president is usually a member or trusted agent of the Donovian elite, and can be absolutely guaranteed to defend the elite’s interests. The president possesses the ability to appoint officials at local and republic levels, guaranteeing large numbers of patronage positions and the overall loyalty of the bulk of the Donovian government.

Judicial Authority

Generally speaking, the judiciary functions as a tool of the executive. While occurrences of petty crime or minor civil matters like divorces are generally competently and fairly handled, political or economically important matters are decided almost uniformly in the fashion that the ruling elite would like them to be decided. Often, this might be directly against the interests of other elites, as the ruling elite of Donovia recognize the international political and economic value of the appearance of an independent judiciary.

Government Effectiveness and Legitimacy

Internationally, most other countries view the Donovian government as effective, though its high levels of corruption reduce the legitimacy the current regime once held as the savior from the sleaze of the Four Traitors. Increasing use of social media and other information age technologies continue to break the Donovian state’s near-monopoly on information, and the more blatant issues of corruption and self-dealing by the economic/political elite in Donovia now sometimes leak out to the country as a whole. The government’s usual response is to stifle such outbursts by the arrest of the whistle-blower, counter-accusations,  and  an occasional  indictment  for corruption or graft.  The Donovian government intends for indictments to prove that the state is “doing something” to stop corruption. Arresting the whistle-blower is especially prevalent when it involves the military or intelligence services, usually on charges of espionage.

Domestic Political Issues

Corruption dominates as the prime domestic political issue, though the authorities go to extensive lengths to ensure their complicity remains hidden from the       public. The structure of the Donovian state, especially after the Four Traitors, allowed a small group with inordinate power to “root out corruption” despite their actual role in the corruption prevalent throughout Donovia. The electoral process serves to reinforce the power of the elite, and the state maintains its power over citizens with the citizen having little recourse. The participation of ethnic or religious minorities is minimal, with a few showpiece individuals who operate as little more than ethnic functionaries.

Elections

Donovian elections usually allow the voter to select between two or more UD-approved candidates, even if no candidate runs under the UD banner. The UD and the government will functionally only allow politicians to run if they support the UD, or more usually, UD loyalists who make a show of defecting to an opposition political party.

Rule of Law

The concept of “rule of law” in a Western liberal context is functionally unknown within Donovia.  The power of the state, combined with its highly incestuous relationship with dominant economic entities, means the likelihood of the individual receiving a fair hearing from an impartial judiciary or independent media forum remains nearly zero. The judiciary is seen by the Donovian populace as widely compliant with political demands, even in the case of high-profile issues. Once charged, the defendant pleads guilty or the court finds in favor of the government’s case with little chance of meaningful appeal by the defendant.

Corruption

Corruption exists across all levels of political life within Donovia. From the policeman to the highest officials, most Donovians consider self-enrichment a hallmark of public life. The relationships between the largest businesses within Donovia and the UD are extensive, and during elections the resources of both the state and private business are used to ensure the political success of the UD.

International Relationships

Donovia attempts to remain typically neutral in regard to US power and forces. The government wants to preserve its regional power position and avoid any perception of Donovian subordination to the US or US interests. While generally adversarial with Atropia, a number of trade and economic links exist, as the Donovians view such links as a method to maintain leverage over Atropia.

Donovia will also aggressively provide diplomatic and material support to Donovian ethnic populations and allied minorities living outside of Donovia. For example, the Donovian government unilaterally issued passports to Gorgans of Donovian ethnicity prior to their most recent conflict. The Donovians then partially defended their actions as justified self-defense of a persecuted minority. Donovia’s nuclear program has also made it the object of targeted international sanctions.

Regional Actors

Donovia consistently attempts to leverage or intimidate its regional neighbors into relationships that prove advantageous to Donovia or Donovian economic interests. As a long-term goal, the Donovian government wants to create a web of political, diplomatic, military, and economic interests with all of its neighbors that will make it functionally impossible for any of these nations to present a security threat to the country, or allow any of these nations to initiate an independent, let alone Western- leaning, political stance. In addition to this diplomatic leverage, Donovian support for militants has created tension in regional bilateral relationships.

Donovia’s relationships with its neighbors are varying and complex. Ariana and Donovia enjoy positive, though unofficial, political and economic relations despite the fact that the two countries  are competing for the role of regional strongman. Relations with Gorgas are frosty at best, as Gorgas wants to insulate itself from Donovian influence and considers the Donovian-backed breakaway republics of South Ostremek and Zabzimek as its territory. Limaria receives considerable assistance from Donovia on both economic and military levels, including natural gas imports and support regarding the autonomous Lower Janga region.

Donovia’s aforementioned support for Limaria in the Lower Janga conflict and its aid to the enclave exemplifies the division between Donovia and Atropia. Donovian-sourced support for the Bilasuvar Freedom Brigade (BFB) operating in the northern Atropian provinces of Vetlia and Erdabil has also created significant tension in the bilateral relationship. Despite these considerations and the mutual distrust between them, strong economic considerations—mainly related to trade—tie the two countries together.

International Organizations

Donovia views its participation in international organizations as a prime means to extend its influence and such participation as a zero-sum game, with Donovian goals as its prime interest. Thus, Donovia contains a mixed bag of associations and allies in such venues as the UN General Assembly, where it aggressively supports peacekeeping operations and other UN activities. Donovia also participates actively in the work of intergovernmental organizations (like the International Red Crescent) everywhere in the world except within or on its own borders, where such activity is considered an affront to Donovian sovereignty. Less than 30 foreign and domestic  non-governmental organizations (NGOs) operate within Donovia, and face significant monitoring and limitations on their activities by the Donovian government.

International Economic Associations

Even though not part of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), Donovia participates extensively in international economic associations, especially those that involve oil and gas discussions. Thus, it follows a somewhat independent pricing model from OPEC, and is quick to play up the independence of Donovian pricing and its ability to secure its oil and gas exports in an effort to gain supplier contracts. Once both sides agree to a contract, the Donovians will use the leverage to gain political and economic concessions in other areas, such as support for Donovian diplomatic initiatives or Donovian corporations’ access to foreign markets.

Military Alliances

Where possible, Donovia continues to develop military alliances, initiate agreements, and distribute influence around the world, especially with its close neighbors. Donovia attempts to leverage economic relationships into military and diplomatic ones, and vice versa. Donovia couples military sales with offers of training and military advising, using the presence of Donovian “boots on the ground” to grant itself equities. Donovia then uses this equity to justify further political/military access and control in foreign countries, or at least accommodation of Donovian economic concerns. The Donovian government often uses military sales as a loss-leader in order to get its foot in the door to further the overall Donovian political/military/economic strategy.

Influential Political Groups

The Unionist Democratic Party serves as the country’s prime political party. While three of the other four main parties (Donovian League, Freedom and Justice, and the Scarlet Party) are nominally independent, they are actually outgrowths of the UD’s attempt to portray Donovia as a Western- style democracy. The New Donovia Party (NDP) is the only true opposition party, but its political power is highly truncated by the actions of the UD.

Official Political Parties

The UD serves as the country’s major domestic political party. It directs three other parties, which while they claim their independence, in reality are staffed with former UD loyalists, and in many cases funded covertly by the UD, to present the façade of a multiparty system. The NDP serves as  the country’s prime opposition political party, operating completely unaffiliated from the UD and attempting to shed light on UD abuses and corruption. Recently, the NDP started to receive some significant support from elements within the military and additional support through social media and the Internet. Some proof of UD or government corruption and graft now reaches the Internet, which forces the government to either disavow the corruption or face the argument of its connivance in corrupt practices. At the national level, the UD’s leaders demonstrate a willingness to throw those caught to the political wolves if necessary to prevent the allegations from coming upon themselves. At the local level, the UD often acts with a much more heavy-handed response, with reports of suspicious deaths for those who report governmental misconduct.

As indicated previously, three additional political parties (Donovian League, Freedom and Justice, and the Scarlet Party) participate in the government and operate officially unaligned. All three parties contain small numbers of elected positions at the national legislative level, with members often appointed to positions in the several Republics. These three parties, however, remain window- dressing for the UD, which they actually support.

Other Domestic Influential Groups

Outside of the UD, the most influential domestic political groups include the National Veterans Association (NVA), the Environmental Donovia Association, and Human Rights of Donovia Campaign. All of these organizations lobby the legislature and attempt to raise public awareness for their projects. The Donovian government often uses the NVA to “test the waters” for potential changes in foreign policy and military affairs, as the NVA maintains significant links to the active Donovian military.

There is broad political support for a wide range of Donovian Arab nationalist organizations, such as youth leagues, language clubs that support Donovian language education, and the like. The UD often uses these organizations to support its political goals and broadcast the overall political message  that merges UD and Donovian state agendas. Indeed, UD party personnel often man many of these organizations, which are funded by state or UD money despite their status as single-issue or advocacy organizations.

Summary

The Donovian state mostly resembles something like a family-owned business. A small group of  elites remain firmly in control, and despite the history of the Four Traitors, continue to use their political power to enrich and empower themselves. Currently, voices of opposition speak out against the corruption, and the fact that events of 20 years ago are potentially repeating themselves does develop some resonance with an increasingly larger percentage of the population. Despite this, the Donovian elite maintain impressive control of the levers of state power, both domestically and internationally. This control, and the resultant positive effects of the mercantilist focus of total integration of political and economic policies, creates considerable popularity for the UD, and thus political stability inside Donovia.