Analiisa Aleksdohter

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Analiisa Aleksdohter
Official portrait of Liz Kendall crop 2.jpg
Aleksdohter in 2018
Mayor of Aalmsted
Assumed office
1 July 2018
DeputyAksel Wiljâmssun
Themis Jonsdohter
Preceded byÞurisas Mâþijassun
Personal details
Born (1974-08-14) August 14, 1974 (age 49)
Friihâben, Aalmsted, Azmara
Political partyWorkers' Party (1991-present)
Alma materAalmsted Law School
Websitewww.stedmaasterabaalmsted.az

Analiisa Aleksdohter is an Azmaran politician and former lawyer who has served as Mayor of Aalmsted since her election in 2018, having previously served as a Member of the Free City Government with the Social Affairs and Deprivation portfolio. She is the city's second female mayor after Maarija Ryginsdohter and the second consecutive mayor from the Workers' Party after Þurisas Mâþijassun.

Early life and education

Analiisa was born on the 14th August 1974 in the Aalmsted borough of Friihâben as the second of two daughters in a lower middle class family. Her parents owned a bookstore which the family lived above and which Analiisa worked shifts at as a teenager. Her mother, Jana Freisdohter, was active within local Workers' Party politics, serving a term as a borough councillor during the late 1980s, and under the influence of her mother Analiisa would join the Workers' Party's youth wing in 1991 as a 16 year old.

Analiisa would attend Friihaben Gâlykskul where she would obtain a GWP covering history economics, chemistry, philosophy and Gaullican, and would successfully apply for Aalmsted Law School, gaining both an LMW in law and a master's degree specialising in labour law. She would pass her legal exams and qualify as a lawyer in 1998.

Career

Legal career

After graduating as a lawyer, Analiisa would gain an entry-level position working in the legal department of Solidaaritât, Azmara's leading public sector union and a key member of the national Bund âb de Arbeiden trade union federation. She would work with the union for over a decade and would both provide legal information to the union and would represent them in court on multiple occasions, notably in a 2009 case concerning a dispute over health and safety legislation and compensation within the Ministry of Education and Research.

Early political career

Analiisa would unsuccessfully run for Aalmsted City Council in the Stefansburg constituency in the 2010 election, being placed sixth on the party's list. She would, however, be successful in the 2014 election and after the resignation of Kaþeriina Hermansdohter in November 2015 she would be appointed to the Free City Government with responsibility over Social Affairs and Deprivation.

Analiisa's tenure as a member of the Free City Government would be marked notably by her criticism of the national centre-right coalition government of Sofija Freidriksdohter, citing cuts to youth services and retraining services as contributing to social exclusion and increases in crime in less affluent areas of Aalmsted such as Friihâben, Oststed and Wiljâmsburg. In the 2016 city budget funding was allocated to her budget for a scheme seeking to invest in arts workshops for young people across the city in order to try and reduce youth crime rates, with the scheme having seen some success with youth crime rates peaking in 2017 before beginning a slow decline.

2018 mayoral election

In March 2018, Analiisa would announce her intention to run for the mayoralty of Aalmsted on a program of increased funding for services tackling deprivation within the city, policies to reduce congestion and encourage pedestrianism within the city centre and extension of the city's subway and shared light rail systems. She would run against the Government Member for Construction and Housing, Haans Jorśsun, for the Workers' Party nomination, and while many tipped Jorśsun as the favourite to win she would pull off a narrow surprise victory with 51.2% of the party vote in the local branch of the party's April primary.

As the Workers' Party candidate, she would find herself the frontrunner in what was largely a four-way race between herself, Jon Leifssun of Gold Flame, Alana Peitursdohter of The Radicals and Giuseppe Mazzucato of the Green Party. In televised debates held, Analiisa would emphasise her pragmatism and wish to work with other forces for the common good and cite her record in the Free City Government, while criticising the role of Jon and Alana's parties in cuts to social services within the city. On polling day of the 24th June, Analiisa would finish first with 32.4% of the vote, with Jon on 16.7%, Alana on 15.9% and Giuseppe on 13.7%. This would trigger a second round of voting on the 1st July, in which Analiisa and Jon would face off against each other and in which she would heavily court Green and Radical voters, emphasising plans to increase green spaces within the city and promising to let citizens have a say over controversial housing projects planned by the city. Ultimately, Analiisa would be successfully elected with 63.2% of the vote to Jon's 36.8% in the final round.

Mayor of Aalmsted

After her successful election as Mayor, Analiisa would attempt to show her pragmatism by building what she would refer to as a "fruit salad" government, appointing politicians from the Radicals and Greens to her Government to form a broad-based progressive government for the city and appointing Aksel Wiljâmssun from the Radicals and Themis Jonsdohter from the Greens as her deputy mayors.

In keeping with a promise she made on the campaign trail and her coalition agreement with the Radicals, Analiisa would agree to a referendum within Eleinasburg over the authorisation of three high-rise social housing developments within the borough on August 15th, which would ultimately result in voters rejecting the proposed developments and the government relocating plans towards Oststed. This move was criticised by many, with a column in Westmaark Nuudaag decrying it as a "concession to the NIMBY lobby of Eleinasburg". Her promise to extend lines on the Aalmsted subway was fulfilled, with an extension to outer Lilijenburg and another to the suburb of Aþerbojner within Groonbank being authorised in September and beginning construction in 2020.

Analiisa's government would face the 2019 Council election a year into office, in which she would propose a common platform with the Radicals and Greens, with her government attempting to frame the election as a referendum on their plan to introduce a congestion charge covering Eleinasburg and Stefansburg alongside efforts to pedestrianise multiple historic streets within the city centre in order to reduce traffic and improve air quality within the city. After the three parties won a collective majority, the plan would be implemented over the second half of the year with the charge first coming into effect on the 1 January 2020 with plans to gradually raise it towards long-term values by 2023. Notably, the plan would draw opposition from the Gold Flame-led borough council in Stefansburg.

In 2022 she was re-elected in the first round with 51.2% of the vote as a joint candidate of the three governing parties, becoming the first mayor to successfully stand for a second term since 2002.

Personal life

Analiisa has never married, has no children and shares a townhouse in Stefansburg with comedian and actor Rygin Matheissun, with whom she owns four cats. While rumours have circulated about a romantic connection between the two, both parties have publicly denied it on multiple occasions. She identifies as agnostic.

Analiisa is a keen chess player and has an interest in folk music, having attended multiple folk festivals while serving as mayor. Her younger sister, Eleina, serves as a Workers' Party member of the Landsmot representing Aalmsted, with her appointment by the Free City Government to the institution seeing accusations of nepotism.

Political positions

Analiisa has been publicly described as "taking no sides" in internal Workers' Party politics, with De Aalmsted Heraald describing her as "being largely non-ideological apart from supporting the retention of the Azmaran social democratic model in public policy" and contrasting her to her predecessor, who was characterised as "the last prophet of professional socialism".

In a 2019 interview, Analiisa referred to herself as a feminist and noted her opposition to prostitution while pledging not to issue any more licences for strip clubs within the city limits. She has, on multiple occasions, taken a more liberal stance than her party as a whole on issues of immigration, noting in her election campaign that "skilled immigration to Aalmsted... has made the city stronger" and stated later in a 2020 interview that "[Aalmsted] would not be the city it is today without its Piraean and Etrurian communities".

In 2021, Analiisa publicly supported government plans to legalise the sale of marijuana in heavily restricted circumstances and to introduce a third gender on official documentation, noting that "banning marijuana had failed" in Aalmsted and that recognising intersex and non-binary identities was "simply common sense".

Electoral history