Kryfonsparliszaiye boycott

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Beginning on 15 September, 1976, the combined 31 seats of the Yaraan Kryfon's Movement and the Pažem Tuszkeya undertook a "Kryfonsparliszaiye boycott", establishing a stance of abstentionism until what they deemed an "adequate response" to the Telk Avenue shooting occurred. The boycott was the first in the history of the Kryfonsparliszaiye, and functionally ground the legislative body to a halt for the next seventeen calendar days as it left just 50 sitting members of the Kryfonsparliszaiye out of a usual 81, in a cycle which had no majority party. Although the boycott was unpopular with the Standard Kryfona population, it was praised in both Yaraa and Tuszke, and prompted an almost immediate response from the incumbent Awaseq government. Nevertheless, formal diplomacy between the government and the abstaining parties was not conducted until the thirteenth day of the boycott, and it was not until day seventeen that a formal deal was agreed upon. The parties officially ended their boycott on 2 October, 1976, but due to the deceased MPs, it was not until 10 December, 1976 that the Kryfonsparliszaiye was fully seated once again.

The boycott was widely regarded as one of the most successful actions in the Tuszkean Political Revolution, although in many respects it marked the end of an era in which Tuszkeans were seen as outsiders to politics within the Kryfona Kingdom. A formal memorial to the boycott was established outside of the Great Hall of Keszanetaa in 1986, and the boycott has since been the subject of several books due to its unusual nature and large scale political ramifications.

Background

Although the idea of abstentionism is not foreign to the Kryfonsparliszaiye, prior to the Telk Avenue shooting, never before had a party adopted it as an official policy. Only brief or small boycotts such as the Seuyastazal boycott in 1830 had previously been attempted, and never before had a seat boycott been successful. More often, filibusters or sit-ins were used by parties to protest legislation or actions, and when that failed open protest in the streets was the means by which changes were accomplished.

The idea of a 'seat boycott' was first reported on about a year and a half before the shooting, when it came up in a conversation between activists from the Zarjeňehu Tuzkeya and members of the Pažem Tuszkeya. Although there is no indication that the idea was followed up on at the time, the idea clearly stuck with several of the Pažem's MPs. A few months after the meeting, in January of 1976, the idea apparently came up again in a Pažem meeting, and was reported on by several newspapers in the region, including the Tuszkean Free Press. Another set of reports about the idea also came up in February of 1976, but in both instances the ideas were again not followed up on, and evidently were not convincing enough to be forwarded to the national party.

Where the idea first truly got its traction was probably with the Keszanetaa branch of the party, whose MPs were planning a large-scale event similar to the 'seat boycott' idea just a few days before the shooting occurred. In response to a piece of legislation that was threatening to be passed, Ozijma Diž and several other high-ranking members of the Keszanetaa branch of the Pažem had brought up the idea of the 'seat boycott' to the national party. What exactly the national party thought of the idea is not known in this case, since the meeting in which it occurred is not a matter of public record and those who attended refuse to speak on the matter, but evidently the party saw enough stock in the idea to use it after the shooting occurred.

Shooting and beginning of boycott

On 14 September, 1976, the Telk Avenue shooting brought the lives of MPs Ozijma Diž and Výka Soreiheňa to an end, and almost killed PM Janý Meodhem, who spent nearly a month in the hospital recovering from his wounds. The only other PM in attendance, Kosmi Noňa, was lightly wounded in the panic during and after the shooting.

The Pažem was one of the first organizations to find out about the shooting, with the party itself finding out within 30 minutes what had happened and the 9 other PMs of the party within an hour. The party's other MPs had been in Nylzsryf at the time of the shooting, awaiting the start of a Kryfonsparliszaiye session. When the news came of the shooting, the session was adjourned immediately, and the MPs were immediately ordered to return to Keszanetaa by the Pažem. At around 3PM, roughly two hours and thirty minutes after the shooting, all of the party's PMs were in Keszanetaa, awaiting further orders and hoping for the best. The best, of course, never arrived, and news of the deaths of Diž and Soreiheňa, both of whom had been pronounced dead on-scene, came in at about 3:30PM.

Sometime around when the news of the deaths came in, one of the PMs of the Pažem suggested that the party should go on a 'strike' of sorts to protest the injustices which were occurring to Tuszkeans. The idea at some point merged with the already extant 'seat boycott' which had been re-suggested a few days earlier, and quickly turned into the basic idea of the Kryfonsparliszaiye boycott. Although several members of the party were hesitant for any such action to be taken, most of the party, having been shocked by the shooting, saw no other option but to highlight the injustice, and a motion to go ahead with the idea passed overwhelmingly.

The first public statement by the Pažem on the matter came just after 5PM, stating that the party would make a decision that night on whether or not it would attend the next day's Kryfonsparliszaiye sessions. Another, roughly 2 hours later at 7PM, was televised, and gave the party's stance on the matter: there was no other option, and until the government took firm action and Tuszkeans could live in the knowledge that they would not be killed for doing everyday things, standing MPs of the party would not attend any Kryfonsparliszaiye hearings, sessions, or meetings beginning the next morning.

First days: the boycott begins

Day 1

Although the Pažem had rather openly stated that it would not participate in the Kryfonsparliszaiye, when the morning of 15 September dawned, it was not immediately clear whether or not such a statement would in fact be acted upon. While the news had come from the party's from office itself, never before had an entire party actively refused to take its seats in the Kryfonsparliszaiye. The story was massive. Anxious news reporters from all across the Kryfona Kingdom and some from the neighboring Arieles Kingdom gathered around the steps of the Kryfonsparliszaiye, awaiting the members' march which occurred every morning. Immediately, when the members marched it became clear that there would be no empty threats: the Pažem's MPs had not shown up, and in fact, neither had the MPs of the Yaraan Kryfon's Movement, which at the time held 18 seats. A total of of 31 MPs did not attend the session, leaving over a third of the chamber of the Kryfonsparliszaiye empty.

Less than an hour after the session began, the YKM's leader at the time, Hosina Farŏn, appeared before cameras at the steps of the Kryfonsparliszaiye to announce that in support of the Pažem and reformation of the system, the YKM would also refuse to take its seats in the Kryfonsparliszaiye. "That this has been allowed to happen at all," spoke Farŏn that morning, "is an active injustice to all Kryfona. We will simply not stand for it, and we call upon everyone to join us in protest until the government takes decisive action against terrorism directed at this nation's minorities." A similar statement was issued by second-in-command Varsu Malosi, who reiterated that the party had "no intentions" of supporting the government until the party felt that justice had been served.

The move by the YKM to stand with the Pažem was applauded by minority parties and liberals. The United Kryfona Party, although nominally right-wing, expressed support for both the YKM and the Pažem, and said that although it would take its seats in the interests of the nation, it would stand in solidarity with the parties until action was taken. The Adborthos Caucus and the Minority Party announced they would demonstrate at the Kryfonsparliszaiye until "justice [is] done for minorities in this nation," while the Revolutionaries, Patriotic Secessionists, Yaraa-Tuszke Alliance, and Yaraan Minority urged their members and constituents to organize in solidarity. The House of Reriskzeiy shut down in solidarity with the Pažem, and although not of the same ideological bent as the Pažem, the Republican Tuszkeyazi and Conservative Party of Tuszke supported this move and called for other right-wing parties to join in the protests.

The centrist and right-wing parties of the Kingdom were somewhat mixed in their reception to the boycott. The Majority Party, Anti-Tyranny Party, and South Vyfarlan Movement did not endorse protest directly, but called for a peaceful resolution to the crisis in a joint statement. The Republican Movement and its affiliate parties also did not endorse the protests, but criticized the government and the incumbent two parties for their inaction and failure to decisively stamp out Impurism despite its looming ban. The Justice Party did not speak directly of the protests, and merely called for a just outcome to be delivered. Among those critical of the protests were the Ayadna Party, the Royalist Alliance, and the Conservative Union–the Kryfona Conservative Party did not release a statement on the matter but party leader Veloriz Dargesh called the protest "unprofessional and thoroughly unnecessary" as a citizen. The Kryfona Alliance, a far right party, called the move "Un-Kryfonic" in nature but otherwise did not comment on the matter.

The two incumbent parties were somewhat confused as to how to navigate the boycott. Although they commanded an overwhelming majority of the seats left (the UKP at the time only controlled 7 of the 50 sitting seats in the Kryfonsparliszaiye), it was clear that any efforts to force through an agenda would be decried as unjust. After congregating in an almost half empty chamber for a little under thirty minutes, members of both parties met in one of the side-rooms. Immediately, it became clear to both that there was presently nothing they could do about the matter, and nothing they could possibly debate. Thus, after less than an hour of time in the Kryfonsparliszaiye, the session met in the chamber adjourned itself, and for the first time the gravity of the situation became clear to both passive observers and those involved in the situation.

Media Conference in the Palace

That afternoon, a second press conference by members of the Pažem and the YKM was called, in which it was said they would give their demands to the government. Although mostly spontaneous and certainly informal, the conference drew a massive media crowd and a great deal of attention from the nation itself. In essence, it was the first real statement on how the Kryfonsparliszaiye would operate for the foreseeable future. Farŏn of the YKM gave the opening statement to the conference, saying that:

"No justice has been served to the people of this nation. No action has been taken by the government to protect the people of this country from discrimination, from terrorism, from violence and hatred. For months, and years, and now decades, the people of this nation have cried out for help from their government, and been systematically denied and ignored. They have given heart, soul, and life itself to the cause for which they fight, and yet our nation deems that they are not worthy of even a basic response or a tacit acknowledgement of wrongdoing. It cannot and will not go on. The government must either take responsibility itself, or the people must force it to."

He continued by saying that no government could ever hope to withstand the force of the people and that–if it came down to it–the Pažem and the YKM were not afraid to use force to achieve their goals. "If force is necessary," said Farŏn, "then so be it. It was force we had to use when the invasion began, and force we had to use when the crisis broke out. Force is not new to us Yaraans, nor is it so to the Tuszkeans, and while we wish to resolve this peacefully, if the government wants to come to blows over the matter we will not hesitate to do so in kind." The gathered crowd responded with thunderous and sustained applause to the statement; Farŏn could not continue his remarks for five minutes because of it.

Farŏn concluded with a simple remark:

"That we must have a conference on this today is disheartening. That a boycott in reaction to years of sustained violence against minorities in this nation is seen by some as 'unpatriotic' or 'un-Kryfona' is saddening. In many ways, however, it is not unexpected. This is what we for years have fought, and what for years after today we will continue to fight. The fight will never be easy, no. It will never be one-hundred percent accepted by the peoples of this nation and the world, no. But it is my hope, and the hope of all the people of our parties and of our minorities that, disheartening as the need to do this is, good will come of it."

Derugan Mikoszäkide, the Pažem's leader, was next to speak. Despite the tragedy that had befallen his party, Mikoszäkide was unusually calm and collected, and he acknowledged as much, saying that: "It may seem perhaps surprising to some of you that I am as composed today as I am, given what has happened." It was necessary, however, in the words of Mikoszäkide, that someone be the rational person to counterbalance those out for blood.

Mikoszäkide nonetheless maintained that those out for blood were simply reacting to decades of oppression by both the government and by the enemies of the Tuszkean state. It was second nature to Tuszkeans, said Mikoszäkide, to call for justice and cry for blood when it was needed–after all, the government had long blown off the terrorism that plagued Tuszke and Yaraa. With the crowd stirred, he continued:

"Those calling for blood are not violent, per se. They are simply accustom to the injustice of the government. We know that the government will do nothing–they have always done nothing. What may seem like an oddity to the masses is simply another day for us Tuszkeans, Yaraans, and minorities all across this Kingdom. And this is not recent–for as long as I have lived, and for as long as many of our parents and grandparents have lived, we have been targeted by the government, by radicals, by extremists and those who seek to undermine us. Well to that I say: no more! We have come very far in all these years–when my mother was a teenager Tuszkeans were only just being allowed into politics–and it is high time that action is taken to end terrorism against the minorities of this country. Until decisive action is taken, we will not stand in our seats."

Aftermath

The media conference was almost immediately televised, and not long after that rebroadcast over a plethora of radio stations in the Kingdom. For the first time in the Kingdom's short history of television and radio, a wholly informal and largely impromptu event was broadcast as it happened. It is estimated that nearly five million people were able to watch the conference as it happened, and millions more knew about it and heard about it within hours. By the day after, nearly every person in the Old World had heard something about the situation in the Kryfona Kingdom.

The responses to the situation came fast and heavy, varying from the plucky leader of the Luenas to King Tyeri Awaseq himself, from the KRP and KLP to the Presidentialist Movement and the Royalist Alliance.

See also