Gabriel Tozulyak
His Excellency Gabriel Tozulyak Габриел Тозулыак | |
|---|---|
.JPG) Tozulyak in 1963 | |
| 5th President of Narozalica | |
| In office 3 October 1955 – 17 July 1971 | |
| Chancellor | Mikhail Petrenko |
| Preceded by | Vladislav Pudovkin |
| Succeeded by | Vilem Gardos |
| 21st Minister-President of Narozalica | |
| In office 4 May 1954 – 3 October 1955 | |
| Preceded by | Vilem Gardos |
| Succeeded by | Vilem Gardos |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Gabriel Bohuslav Vajcsak Tozulyak December 20, 1910 Arciluco, Arciluco, Kingdom of Amathia |
| Died | January 16, 2002 (aged 91) Cuanstad, Imagua and the Assimas |
| Political party | Narozalic Nationalist Party |
| Military service | |
| Allegiance |  Narozalica |
| Branch/service | Marines |
| Years of service | 1929–1941 |
| Battles/wars | Great War |
Gabriel Bohuslav Vajcsak "Gabi" Tozulyak (/'tɒzʊl:jæk/ Narodyn: Габриел Бочуслав Вайцзак Тозулыак; 20 December 1910 – 16 January 2002) was a Narozalic military officer and later politician who served as the 5th President of Narozalica from 1955 until he was removed from power by a coup d'état in 1971. Tozulyak enlisted in the marine forces in 1929 when he was just 19, serving in the Great War for six years, and for two of those, in then-incumbent president Vladislav Pudovkin's regiment fighting Gaullica in modern-day Aimilia as backup infantry. He retired from the armed forces in 1941, but was reappointed to First Man by an aging Pudovkin in 1949 following the death of Alexandr Batamuta. He served in the position until 1953 when he was named as Pudovkin's successor. When Pudovkin died in 1955, he ascended to the role of President on October 3.
Tozulyak's early reign was marked with increased media censorship, disdain towards the early Euclean Community, and increased alignment with the Equalist regime in Amathia. Fearing the east of Euclea were becoming technologically superior, especially military-wise, Tozulyak implemented a military modernisation program to upgrade the equipment (most of which was still Great War-era), which relied heavily on austerity measures implemented in 1955. The funding problems were only exacerbated when Swetania successfully tested its first nuclear weapon, with Tozulyak investing heavily in Narozalica's nuclear program, culminating in Orel-1's success in 1956. Tozulyak was often criticised for widening the gap between the rich and poor of Narozalica, giving little thought to the lower-class of Narozalica, whom he is documented referring to as "the smallest cog in the machine".
Throughout the 1960s, Tozulyak's reign saw heavy increases in arrests for treason and journalistic disappearances, as well as increased reports of torture being used by interrogation squads of the Narozalic Armed Forces. He continued to invest in Amathia, especially in their nuclear energy program, but this increased spending abroad began to be criticised by divergent wings of the Narozalic Nationalist Party, particularly the traditional Olsovian nationalists. Tozulyak was criticised by his nationalist contemporaries for so-called "bias" towards Amathia due to his birthplace, and his funding of the Equalists despite Narozalica's own economic problems was labelled "traitorous" by his Chancellor Mikhail Petrenko in 1968, after which he resigned, and Tozulyak removed the position. In 1970, his eventual successor and then influential Nationalist Party member Čeněk Kapisinsky resigned from the party, along with 146 other high-ranking members, creating a divergent party that would go on to form Slava!, in what is now known as the Kapisinsky Purge. As Tozulyak began to lose his internal allies, his grip on power loosened, and he was ousted from power on July 17, 1971, by Kapisinsky and his party. He was later exiled from the country, ending up in Imagua and the Assimas, where he would spend the rest of his live until his death in 2002.