Martinson wins, Woshkal loses

It has been a long election, but finally, it is Dr. Benjamin Martinson who has become the Secretary General of the International Democratic Union Council. After there had been a tie between Martinson and Mr. Marlon Keegan, Kedalfax, at the end of the regular voting time, the Council delegations of Kedalfax and Saidercray came to an understanding with each other that a second ballot should decide the election. But then, an initiative from the Eisophcan delegation, favouring that a lately arrived vote for Martinson by Gnejs be counted, brought an unexpectedly quick solution, as Mr. Keegan accepted the plan and removed what stood between Dr. Martinson and the post of the Secretary General.
Dr. Martinson praised Keegan's "self-less and generous decision". In his first speech as Secretary General, he appointed Mr. Keegan as General Secretary.

Meanwhile, President Woshkal dropped plans for a plebiscite on the end of Saidercray's UN membership. Polls didn't promise much consent with the President's plans. Furthermore, the pro-UN socialists, the second member of Woshkal's PPJ-SPS-coalition, refused to support the plan. In how far this failure will weaken Woshkal's and the PPJ's position until the next National Election, is still incalculable.

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"Like the catcher in the rye"

Interview with Dr. Benjamin Martinson, candidate for the IDUC Secretary General

Shortly after he had been nominated as Saidercray's candidate for the post of the IDUC's Secretary General, Dr. Benjamin Martinson (59), former chairman of the Supreme Court and well-known for his liberal jurisdiction, has been interviewed by Saidercray Today.

ST: Dr. Martinson, congratulations to your nomination. After you had retired from the chairmanship of the Supreme Court in 2005, many believed your time as a public figure to be over. Now, two years later, you return with a new role. How did this happen?
Martinson: When I retired from chairmanship, President Woshkal eludicated towards me that he would like to see me playing an active role for Saidercray again once I would be well again. Of course, he thought of a comeback as judge of the Supreme Court - which, as you know, never took place. I felt the need to re-organize my life, to start something new. Therefore the government didn't have to talk insistently on me when they phoned me and asked me if I think I could do this job. I confered with my wife, slept on it and then I phoned them back and became Saidercray's candidate.
ST: If you become Secretary General, you will have "the exclusive authority to place bills up for debate and vote" and the General Secretary shall be "appointed by" you. How do you intend to fulfill these tasks and to lead the Council?
Martinson: I don't see me much as a leader but as a caretaker, which means that I would give the Council members a free hand and only intervene if really necessary, if for example a resolution is illegal due to the determinations of a previously passed one. I would be like the catcher sitting in the rye, not particpiating in the game itself but sitting there to prevent any kind of catastrophy from happening.
As far as the post of the General Secretary is concerned, I would propose the candidate whom I see as most suited to serve the Council's interest, and who doesn't come from Saidercray, too.
ST: As you may have read in our article one week ago, parts of the government including Preisdent Woshkal wish to leave the UN after Saidercray will have become a member of the IDUC. Whereas the accession to the IDUC is commonly taken for certain, the UN question disunites the government, the parliament and the people. What is your opinion on this topic?
Martinson: As far as I remember, there has been a plebiscite last year with a relatively clear outcome. The government should bend to this decision, and if they want a new plebiscite on it, they should wait until after the new election in summer.
ST: At the moment, you have three competitors - Dr. Freeman from Nimali, Dr. Dieckmann from the Schnauzer Dominions and Mr. Keegan from Kedalfax. What is your opinion on them?
Martinson: They are all worthy competitors, and no matter whether someone of them will win or I, the Council will have a good and qualified first Secretary General.
ST: Thank you, Dr. Martinson.

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Woshkal's longing for the middle road

Whoever meats Ian Woshkal in these days and listens to him when he speaks about the planned International Democratic Union Council may easily be surprised. In the last days, the government started a great publicity campaign for the IDUC to make the people vote "yes" in the plebiscite which will decide whether Saidercray will join the Council or not, once it's finally established. Woshkal insisted upon participating in a lot of events, commuted between the cities of Saidercray and Klouch, far in the north-east of the IDU, where the debate about the Council takes place. Vis-à-vis with Saidercray Today, he proclaimed: "I feel that something great is going to originate, and I am proud to be able to participate in this." Is this really the same man who announced after his victory in the 2004 Presidential Election that he wanted to make Saidercray a model for other states without allowing other states to force laws upon it? Is this the man who reluctantly applied for Saidercray's UN membership some months ago because a plebiscite compelled him to do it? Yes, he is it.

For if you examine more closely on Woshkal's change, you'll ascertain that there hasn't been such a great change at all. Apart from a failed draft for an anti death penalty resolution and the participation in the election of the delegate, Saidercray's UN policy restricted itself to voting on some resolutions and is far away from showing eagerness or initiative. "The initial hope to saidercrayanize other UN states via resolutions from our side dissipated when we were confronted to a system where many blocker resolutions such as the so-called Fair Sentencing Act prohibit real changes in many parts. The good things we can still export to the UN do therefore not measure up to the bad things we get from it", says the PPJ's General Secretary Howard Tolcan.

Woshkal shares this negative attitude towards the UN. Now as before, he is the model state creator who's ambitions in foreign policy are more or less limited to economic aid to developing countries of the third world and to the role of the negotiator who tries to prevent international conflicts from escalating. He really welcomes exchange of views with other states, but he wants to remain the master of his own house, sharing his power with the parliament and the people, not with multinational organizations. Since our country's first hour in the United Nations, he wants to leave them, but he knows he can't do this. Unless he offers a better alternative to the people. Now, the new Council can become this alternative the President longs for. The only thing he has to do, and that's what Woshkal's trying at the moment: He has to convince the people that a Saidercrayan membership in the Council is good, and that it is better than a membership in the Council and in the UN.

The scenario of a membership in both the UN and the Council would be Woshkal's worst nightmare, for then he wouldn't have one, but two international legislative organisations above him. It's not enough if the new organization seems to be nice, it has to be excellent and much better than the UN. Only then, the double strike - withdrawal from the UN plus accession to the Council - can succeed and Woshkal's Saidercray would be nothing more than a founding member of a small organisation who's resolutions and decisions it could co-design and co-determine from the first day on.

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