Metrati Anar Abolished
ANARÍS, Unorganized Tavari Union Territory (TavariFax)-- The Council of the Tavari Union has abolished the Union Territory of Metrati Anar, all twelve of its townships, and all four of its chartered municipalities, including the City of Anarís. The territory’s Administrator, Assembly, and every one of its elected legislative bodies at the municipal level are all now out of a job, effective immediately. Government in the archipelago is now the direct responsibility of the Council of the Tavari Union, which has quite literally erased all reference to Metrati Anar in the Ranat Accords in a unanimous vote.
“The Union Territory of Metrati Anar is hereby immediately abolished and immediately ceases to have any legal existence or authority whatsoever,” said Union Council President, and President of Metradan, Shtonar Talakar. “The Royal Tavari Armed Forces are now, as we speak, entering all government offices in the former territory to ensure that all state property is safely transferred out of the control of the former legislators and that all former legislators are escorted out of the buildings they no longer have right to be in.”
The decision came after the Council went into recess during a very heated meeting in which now former administrator Edori Navar Tendrokai outright refused to allow his territory to adopt a home rule charter because, according to him and a supermajority of the former legislators of the territory across various levels of government, the financial costs would have exceeded their ability to pay. This has been bitterly disputed by the Council of the Tavari Union, and is also rendered suspect given that the much smaller territory of the Avtovati Isles has been able to operate its own public schools, hospitals, and transport systems without issue since May of 2023. The meeting devolved into a shouting match after Mr. Navar Tendrokai insinuated, among other things, that forcing Metrati Anar to pay for its own schools was an act of colonialist imperialism, that it was tantamount to taking the side of Bana in the Great War, and that Tavaris would have to send in its military to force any change.
It would seem that Tavaris has done exactly that, with former East Anarís Township Supervisor Metela Vobai posting on Pigeon that “Royal Tavari Marshalls just came and physically removed my hands from the keyboard I was typing on.” The Royal Tavari Marshalls have declined comment for this article but according to Ms. Vobai, the Marshall apprehending her said “You’re fired. Time to leave.”
“As the former government of Metrati Anar readily agreed to and insisted upon several times today, the Council of the Tavari Union is the ultimate authority in charge of governance in Metrati Anar. The former government has outright absconded in its duty and refused to follow the Ranat Accords that it itself helped write, signed, and ratified. As a result, that government has been rendered null and void. This Council will now govern the islands as we proceed to adopt a home rule charter,” said Tavari Prime Minister Žarís Nevran Alandar, who noted that a charter has been fully drafted for more than a year while the former Assembly refused to even hold an up-or-down vote on it.
Former Administrator Edori Navar Tendrokai was not given a chance to comment on the decision in the council chambers and was instead physically pushed out of the room by the Council’s security while stammering and shouting at the Council. Outside the chamber, he attempted several times to force his way back in, shouting variously that the Council had no authority to fire him, that it was a military coup, and that without his job he couldn’t get home because he had had a territorial government chauffeur and car take him to the meeting and, due to budget cuts, busses had stopped running in his neighborhood.
The only response from inside the chamber came from Matron Vana Dandreal, who laughed out loud and replied “and whose fault is that? Have fun walking.”
President Talakar assured the public that there would be little to no disruption of public services because, in essence, they were really all still being provided by Tavaris anyway, and that they would continue to do so until the new government was established. “Now that the Council’s authority over the territory is clear, we will be able to establish the new government without delay, and we expect Anarašta self-governance to be in place well before the Union’s second anniversary this June.” The Council also passed a resolution mandating that all Union member states contribute to the costs of administering the islands, which it noted, as a territory, “are to be considered to belong to all the people of the Union everywhere, a condominium between all the member states, with every citizen entitled to come here and share in this beautiful place.”
The Ranat Accords had laid out an extensive process of community consultation in regard to home rule, but those provisions were erased in regard to Metrati Anar by the Council’s amendment today, leaving the process as theoretically simple as a single vote by the Council to adopt a new charter without requiring the approval of any other body or even a referendum. The Council in principle committed itself to a referendum on any future charter, as well as to elections for new governments at the territory and municipal levels, no later than June 6th. While this commitment, unlike the prior ones, is not entrenched in the Ranat Accords, the members of the Council took great pains to emphasize that they intended to act as closely to the spirit of the original Accords as possible.
“We don’t delight in this. This isn’t what we wanted or what anyone wanted. But we have so many other issues to deal with, and it simply wasn’t fair for Metrati Anar to outright refuse the obligations that, we really can’t emphasize enough, it had already legally committed itself to when it, again, entirely voluntarily and under its own freely given authority, ratified the Ranat Accords,” said Matron Vana Dandreal, who represented Acronis at the meeting in place of the Chief Administrator. “We are still committed to all the same things we were committed to before. Metrati Anar will have an elected legislature, an elected head of government, and there will be local control with real Anaraštani making the day-to-day decisions, and no charter will be imposed unless the people, the real citizens of these islands, explicitly votes in its favour.”
“We cannot afford to waste any more time with unfair, illegal obstinance on the part of entirely out-of-line administrators. Our action today corrects the illegality of Metrati Anar’s former administration, and now we can continue forward with the democratic government we already pledged ourselves to create. The 1.6 million people on these islands can rest assured that they are still the ones who are in charge. They will vote for their own leaders and they will vote for their own charter,” said Tavari Prime Minister Žarís Nevran Alandar.
On a temporary basis, the Council has decided to create a “Metrati Anar Advisory Board” that will consist of Anarašta citizens appointed by the Council and will review all matters that come before the Council in relation to governing the territory. “Ideally, very soon, hopefully as soon as we make the appointments, the Council will actually delegate its lawmaking authority to the Advisory Board so that local residents continue to hold the real authority,” said Brõhal Nankar Catti, Metrati Anar’s elected Union Council Delegate and now the only elected official from the islands. Mr. Nankar Catti is to chair the advisory board.
For his part, Mr. Nankar Catti has promised “to serve Metrati Anar through and through, no matter what it takes… even raising taxes,” he quipped.