Oskar Aikio
Director Oskar Aikio | |
|---|---|
 Oskar Aikio, 1901 | |
| 1st Director of Alriika | |
| In office 1 January, 1900 – 21 April, 1910 | |
| Succeeded by | Henrik Haetta |
| General of the Blue and Grey Brigade | |
| In office 5 February, 1897 – 1 January, 1900 | |
| Succeeded by | Himself as Director |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Oskar Eliassen Aikio November 30, 1835 Jeagleahki, United Kingdom of Lhedwin |
| Died | April 21, 1910 (aged 74) Sangashámman, Alriika |
| Political party | Independent |
| Spouse | Ester Aikio |
| Children | 2 |
| Military service | |
| Allegiance |  Alriika |
| Branch/service | Blue and Grey Brigade |
| Years of service | 1895–1900 |
| Rank | General |
Oskar Eliassen Aikio (30 November 1835 – 21 April 1910; aged 74) was an Alriikan economist, professor, author, and politician who served as Alriika's first Director between 1900 and 1910, the general and spiritual leader of the Blue and Grey Brigade, a former Almic branch of the Lhedwinic Army which fought against Lhedwinic occupation in the Great War - between 1895 and 1900, and a former member of the Lhedwinic Chamber of Peers for Alriika between 1862 and 1866. Considered the most influential founding father of Alriika, he is regarded as the most pivotal figure in modern Almic history.
Oskar Aikio was born under a poor family in Jeagleahki, Alriika, in 1835. A victim to the predatory culturally erasing practices of the Lhedwinic Mission System, Aikio was removed from his family and placed in an adoption system in Kalgnat. Adopted by the Eliassen family, an influential family of accountants, Oskar would find himself learning in some of the most prestigious preparatory schools in the nation, and graduated with high honors from The University of Kalgnat in 1856. There, he would serve as an economist and a professor at the university before returning to become a charter sponsor for the Alriikan Technical Institute, the first university of its kind on the island. There he would continue his work, though he suffered a bout of depression. He always had struggled with being able to reunite with his birth parents, and would never be able to find them. While many records were lost in the aftermath of the Great War, it is assumed his family died in a debtor’s mining camp. Determined to help aid the state of the workers of Alriika, he ran for public office, replacing the Chamber member from Alriika and served for four years, only to become disgusted by what he would later describe as “empirically showable as the distinctively unique and impenetrable true criminal underbelly of Lhedwinic society” and resign, to further his writings, which now grew to include critiques of capitalism and of authority. Many of these writings would not see print in Lhedwin until after the Great War, and were heavily censored by the government. He would counter this by framing his criticisms as against Alemannia, writing A Critique of the Alemannian Ideology in 1865, and would refuse to seek out Lhedwinic publishers for his remaining works, traveling to Alemannia and western Asura, settling for a time in Ainhar, to write Poverty of Property and The Modern Peasant. As he had grown to be rather wealthy due to the successes of these books, he was slowly but surely becoming less and less welcomed by the governments of the states he lived in. In 1872, he was barred from returning to Alriika or anywhere else in the United Kingdom of Lhedwin. Moving to Liiduria in 1876, he wrote a book regarding the situation of the Almic people, the situation of which was largely ignored or suppressed by the UKL. Under the pen name Bavi, he wrote On Revival: Rediscovery of Culture in the Face of the Almic Situation, a book that would detail the conditions of Almic erasure in the hands of the Lhedwinic crown. He described the debtor’s camps, often a place where reindeer herders would find themselves in after losing their grazing land to land speculators, the Lhedwinic Mission System that snatched children like himself from poor families, the forced renamings of surnames and attempted destruction of Almic tradition, along with the evident destruction of the environment, with Alriika’s forests becoming “like twigs in the tinderbox of the royal monster.” Two years later he would write Idolatry of the Throne, a broader critique of monarchism. During his exile in Liiduria, he would ensure the slow but steady smuggling of material to the Alriikan Technical Institute, specifically his colleague at the university, renowned poet and literature professor Siiggur Taave - who would secretly distribute the books to various activists. Oskar would continue to write, with 1882’s A Book About Your Father outlining Aikio’s ideal society for an Almic state.
As the Great War was becoming more and more evidently near, he would begin to write a series of newspaper articles for a paper in Idalinne, Liiduria, which would later be compiled into his prophetical work The Old Monsters. In this book, he characterized the coming conflict as “Lumbering giants, aged and grey, their bones cracking and their eyes hollow, growling into the bitter cold, once again returning to the hallowed ground of death to inflict one last great pain upon the world. The monsters await their final battle.” His words would come true as the war would erupt in every continent, the Great War afoot. It was then he learned a plot for revolution in his country, in retaliation for the deaths of hundreds of miners for distribution of Pro-Almic writings, including pieces by Siigur Taave and Henrik Haetta, the latter of which would petition the aging Aikio to join his militia as a spiritual leader. Initially refusing, he was pressured further into it by the Liidurian Government. Eventually he agreed, and in 1897 he would secretly travel to Alriika, just in time to kick off what is known in Alriika as the Almic Revival. Refusing to combat himself, he cloistered himself deep in the hills where he would direct orders, write inspirational speeches, and write for support from the Grand Alliance, where he got his support in the form of Liidurian advisors who helped plan and execute the attacks on the Karlshavn Shipyard, and later Sangashámman itself in 1899, removing the Lhedwinic control over the island and solidifying the militia’s rule over the new nation on the 1st of January, 1900.
His challenges were not yet over, as Siiggur Taave and Henrik Haetta had great disagreements over how Alriikan society should evolve. Siiggur Taave saw the destruction of Almic culture as a chance to rebrand it as one that embraced progress, while Henrik Haetta wanted a full return to the days before Lhedwinic rule. Oskar Aikio acted as a mediator to resolve the conflicts in setting up a parliament with a federal council, with the first members of the council being himself and the two others. This council, known as the Ringet, were responsible with executing the laws passed by the parliament. In 1903, Oskar Aikio proposed the National Siida, a concept of direct democracy that required technology not yet available. Determined to remain non-partisan, he refused to join any political parties to form, as he firmly believed joining any of them would “create a personality cult instead of a parliament”. His tenure as Director of the Ringet was focused on rebuilding the society, culture, and wellbeing of the Almic people. He instituted harsh land reforms that redistributed unused land back into the common trust of the Alriikan Farmers and Herders Association, reinstituted ancestral homes into the hands of the Alriikan people, and rebuilt several destroyed towns from scratch, including his hometown he never got to fully enjoy, Jeagleahki. His policies also included deporting many Lhedwinic landowners, businessmen, and stockholders, redistributing their assets back to the Alriikan people.
It was then he would begin to foster relations with other states to form from the Great War, including leaders of Glanodel, Nausikaa, Crethia, and Ainhar, though it was with Ainharic leader Martyn Mederel that he would foster a personal friendship that would carry on throughout the rest of his life. They shared similar economic policies, and shared lively debate among their social policies. Due to this friendship, Ainhar and Alriika established the Ainharic-Alriikan Cultural Exchange (AACE or ACE for short) in 1909 to promote cultural exchanges between the two nations due to their historical affiliations with each other. It would be among the last things Aikio did politically, his age causing him to become more reclusive than before. He suffered from what he called “night hoss,” though he refused to go into detail as to what it meant. It is thought that he was referring to neuropathy of the legs. His last book, A Collection of Short Stories, detailed nearly a hundred short anecdotes, including children’s tales, quotes, and a recipe for Beef Wellington. Oskar Aikio died on the 21st of April, 1910, in his home in Sangashámman of a heart attack. He was 74 years old. Largely considered as the most important figure in modern Alriikan history, he is considered a hero in the eyes of Alriika and is also revered in pan-Kalic circles throughout Asura. His visage is seen on the forward of the Alriikan ruhta bill.