Summer of Democracy
| Summer of Democracy 民主主義の夏 | |||
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 Hundreds of thousands of people flood the streets around Hoterallia's National Diet building, June 18, 1999 | |||
| Date | May 22– July 25, 1999 (2 months and 3 days) | ||
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| Resulted in | Opposition victory
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The Summer of Democracy (Hoterallian: 民主主義の夏, Minshu Shugi no Natsu), also known as the Economic Stagnate Revolution or the Summer Revolution, was a series of popular demonstrations in Hoterallia, mostly in the national capital of Orajioe and the port city of Dai-Minato, lasted from May 22 to July 25, 1999. There was a sustained campaign of civil resistance against limited freedom of expression and electoral fraud. The nonviolent revolution led to the resignation of Nobuo Takaida, the end of a 20-year long dictatorship of the Juriko, the putting of heavy restrictions of the Gunkokushugi, and the restoration of proper democracy in Hoterallia.
It is referred to as the Summer of Democracy due to the usage of the song "Summer of Love" as a symbol of protest following the implementation of the Chinmoku Act that suppressed the freedom of expression. It was widely seen as a victory of the people against two decades of rule by Nobuo, and made news headlines as "the revolution that surprised Anteria".
The majority of the demonstrations took place during the hot summer of 1999. The revolution involved over two million Hoterallian civilians, as well as several political and military groups, and religious groups. The protests, fueled by the resistance and opposition from years of governance by Head of Ministries Nobuo and his cronies, culminated with the official resignation of Nobuo and the end of the short-lived Juriko-Gunkokushugi coalition. The Head of the Taihago at the time, Koroshi Tsuji, was immediately installed as the new Head of Ministries as a result of the revolution and a snap election.
Background and history
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Head of Ministries Nobuo Takaida was elected the Head of Ministries of Hoterallia in 1979, replacing the previous representatives' leader of the Juriko, Komono Nishikawa. During this time, Nobuo was very active in the initiation of public works projects and the intensification of tax collections. Using the recovering economy of Hoterallia to, what the faction called at the time to, "built more roads than all his predecessors combined and more schools than any previous administration, to regain the Hoterallian standing in Anterian politics". But to keep his faction and oppositions loyal and supportive to him, he bribed many government officials and politicians, which later became "Nobuo's Cabinet".
Nobuo's term for the Head of Ministries was marred by allegations by the opposition Taihago and Kodoha of widespread graft and corruption. According to leftists group and the Mazuki, the increasing disparity of wealth between the wealthy and the poor that made up the majority of the Second Empire population led to a rise in crime and civil unrest around the country.
The empire's democratization movements, which had been failing to gain support during Nobuo's tenure, were being revived. With the beginning of a new semester in March 1980, professors and students expelled for pro-democracy activities returned to their universities, and student unions were formed. These unions led nationwide demonstrations for reforms, including an end to Juriko's monopoly over the National Diet, democratization, human rights, and better minimum wage. These activities culminated in the anti-government demonstration at Dai-Minato University on May 15, 1980, in which about 100,000 students and citizens participated.
In response, Nobuo took several suppressive measures. To forcibly stop the demonstration, troops were dispatched to various districts of Dai-Minato. On the same day, the Dai-Minato Police Department raided an underground national conference of student union leaders from 35 universities across Hoterallia, who were gathered to discuss their next moves in the wake of the May 15 demonstration. Sixteen politicians were arrested on charges of instigating demonstrations.
The Death of Shingo Inōe
After the crackdown of the May 15 demonstration, many student activists in Dai-Minato University continue to struggle against Nobuo's dictatorship. Shingo Inōe, the president of the student council in the Department of Economics of Aoimori Public University, was one of those students. Detained during an investigation into such activities, Shingo refused to confess the whereabouts of one of his fellow activists. During the interrogation, authorities used waterboarding techniques to torture him, eventually leading to his death on May 29th.
Information surrounding the events of Shingo's death was initially suppressed. However, the Catholic groups in Dai-Minato found out and revealed the truth to the public on June 1st, further inflaming public sentiment.
Establishment of The Juriko-Gunkokushugi Coalition
To gain even more support for the faction, the Juriko struck a deal with the Ultranationalist Faction of Gunkokushugi, which had been winning support throughout the years' thanks to its spread of nationalism, misinformation and scare tactics left from the Second Reunification War. As the coalition is fully finished, the Gunkokushugi announced many proclamations and acts that solidify the power of the newly created coalition, many of the acts allow the authority to suppress and abolish the freedom of speech, the freedom of the press, and many other civil liberties.
The Gunkokushugi started to implement the Chinmoku Act (沈黙法, Chinmoku-hō), which aims to crackdown any oppositions, as well as discourage the mass populace to vote the oppositions into office. They later enacted the Three Forbidden (三つの禁止, Mittsu no Kinshi):
- 政府を判断することはありません。(No judging the government.)
- 政府に反対することはありません。(No opposing the government.)
- 政府と戦うことはありません。(No fighting the government.)
The Three Forbidden was announced throughout the country, causing confusion and anxiety among the people of Hoterallia, most concerning of which were the democratic activists, student unions, and even leftists and trade unions.
October Diet Incident
Meanwhile, in the National Diet, the Juriko and Gunkokushugi still have some major oppositions left, notably the Taihago, Kodoha and the Mazuki. Although now the oppositions controlled only about a third of the seats in the Diet, and thus lacked the votes to prevent ratification, they used a variety of parliamentary tactics to drag out debate, in hopes of preventing any more ratification of unfair and undemocratic acts and giving the extra-parliamentary protests more time to grow.
Sensing more oppositions will appear, Nobuo became increasingly anxious to ratify and enact more declarations in time. Moreover, the Diet session was scheduled to end almost a month earlier, on September 27th, 1985. Late in the evening on October 1st, Nobuo took the desperate measure of suddenly and unexpectedly calling for a 50-day extension of the Diet session. When democratic Diet members staged a sit-in in the halls of the Diet, Nobuo took the unprecedented step of calling 500 police officers into the Diet chambers and having opposition lawmakers physically removed from the premises. Thereafter, with only members of his faction present, he passed the extension of the Diet session. A final shock came after midnight, just after the extension was approved when Nobuo then called for immediate ratification of acts.
Nobuo's "anti-democratic" actions during this October Diet Incident (十月のダイエット事件, Jū-Tsuki no daietto jiken) stunned the nation, causing more chaos and civilian oppositions against him. In late October and into November, the anti-Government protests greatly increased in size, as many ordinary citizens took to the streets to express their outrage, and the aims of the protests expanded from protesting all of the enacted declarations, to oust Nobuo and to "protect democracy." Large protests around the National Diet occurred on a near-daily basis, and large-scale protests were staged in city centers all over Hoterallia. In December, many labor federations carried out a series of nationwide general strikes.