Malentina

Malentina, officially the Presidential Confederacy of Malentina, is a country in Crona. The nation, as a set of islands, sits in the Malentine Sea. While separated from the mainland Malentina has maritime borders with the following nations: Istrenya, Porlos, Kelekona, Telekona and Arcerion.

Etymology
Malentina is a somewhat modern name taken from the term commonly used in to refer to the tribes living on the islands that the nation now encompasses, Malentinu. This term developed from combining the two most common tribe names, the Maaleens and the Tinuuds. The name was a way for the native people to "take back" the lands that ones belonged to them alone from the colonizing Levantine population.

Geography
The many islands including the three main ones that make up the malentine archipelago are quite similar. One of the most notable features is that with the exception of small regions in the northern-most and southern-most parts of the islands the islands are incredibly flat, with only short hills cut by shallow valleys.

Climate
Throughout the islands one can find a quite diverse climate, featuring everything from mangrove swamps, to forest covered plateaus.

Because of economic pressures the vast majority of the island has been reduced to agricultural fields, with only small forests dotting the landscape with a few national parks as the only exceptions.

First Refugees
Although there is very few records of the times when the first oceanic travelers settled on the Malentine islands, especially since the history was mainly passed down verbally, it is very hard to know exactly when, how many or over how long these first settlers arrived. What is known is that around the year 800 AD there were enough tribes settled on the islands to leave notable archeological evidence. These tribes spent less time warring with each other than one might expect for the period, which together with a few weak pieces of evidence is used by some to advocate that the tribes used their knowledge of ocean travel to raid the mainland.

There is a theory with a lot of support from a number of historical sources that these first settlers were driven from their homelands by the arrival of the Arzalian worshipers of Varshan or other lesser nations following the same faith. Folklore passed down both from other native sources on the mainland as well as within the malentine tribes both help support this belief.

Over the next two centuries the islands population slowly transformed from small local tribes to larger societies of trade and alliances between larger tribes formed from the often forceful unification of the original tribes.

During this period there were two most important developments for the peoples of these lands: The evolving methods for ocean navigation through the use of the sun, moon and stars together with larger boat construction as well as a calendar system based on the lunar phases.

Confederation of the Seven Tribes
It is believed that sometime just before the millennium shift there was a great meeting between the seven strongest of the larger tribes. These seven not only came to an agreement on a large group of agreements that would in a sense join them all together into a single confederation, but also ended this great meeting with a division of the lands of the islands between each other, ensuring that there would be peace between them.

There is a lot of later evidence that this was not in fact the case, and that there were still at least some smaller conflicts between the tribes. But there is also good archeological evidence that the amount of people living on the islands started to grow fast following this period.

Looming Threat of the Arzali
Although the exact timing of their arrival is still not quite certain the influence of the Arzali would reach most of the coastline of the malentine sea, and even beyond. While the difficulties of crossing the treacherous waters between the malentine tribes and the Arzali proved to be a hindrance, it wasn't long before the two started interacting. These include the first good archeological evidence for the Malenti raiding settlements on the mainland.

First and Second Arzali Invasions
Thanks to records from Varshan it is known that in the early 14th century there were attempts by the Arzali on the coast to subjugate the island tribes raiding their settlements. This lead to the first and second attempted invasions of the islands. The wars were mainly determined by two factors: the treacherous waters and weather around the islands and the tactics used by the island tribes.

While the mainlanders fought the war by attempting to march enough soldiers to the enemy settlements to defeat them directly, the raiders of the island simply spent their time raiding whatever they could, most often during the night. The folklore of the islands specifically speaks of a period called "The Five Nights of Red", where over the course of five nights the tribal confederation burned down almost every single ship belonging to the invading forces, leaving the soldiers who reached the islands completely isolated. Still, through out the conflict the invaders successfully torched most of the two most northern tribes, and while the mainlanders most likely lost far more people and resources through out the war, the tribes simply had far more to lose. In the end the invaders seized their attempts to subjugate the island tribes, instead improving the defenses of the coastal settlements.

Collapse of the Confederacy
The long-term damage of the invasions would quickly show, as the balance between the tribes on the islands had been shattered. Two tribes almost completely gone and the remaining five in vastly difference shapes. The internal conflicts on the islands ramped up greatly, leaving them far weaker when the first explorers from lands far away arrived.

Government
The Malentinan government is mainly inspired by the confederate system in Arcerion, despite how it may first appear. While the highest offices differ greatly from Arcerion, it has many functional similarities. The ruling body is separated into four main components: The Senate, the Parliaments, the Internal cabinets and the External cabinet. The most notable differences is the fact that the Malentinan republic is a presidential system, as well as having no single representative for the entire confederation.

Since the Malentinan government in it's current state has only existed for a few decades, as well as the tension between the different cultural groups within the nation, the state suffers from a lack of legitimacy in the eyes of many of it's people. The actions of their predecessors also weaken the nations foreign policy with most of the first-world nations, leading to more closer ties to local neighbors as well as none Levantine nations such as Coruum and Caphiria.

Elections for the position of president as well as lower house positions differ between the three republics. While each presidential vote takes place every seven years they each have their own institutions for carrying out these elections. The lower houses differ greatly, a good example of which is the large differences in elections. Parliamentary elections are carried out every two, five and seven years respectively for the House of Commons, the Gathering of the West and the Northern Assembly respectively.

Executive
Under the Treaty of the New Confederation, Malentina separates it's executive branch into three separate institutions, all of which function somewhat differently. These three presidential offices is usually referred to as the Treaty Triad, and together make up the head of state and government for each of the three confederated republics. They each bring with them a number of cabinet members to help serve the executive roles of external affairs. How the executive actions for the confederacy as a whole such as important trade agreements are to be carried out use a simple majority compromise system, where each of the republics receive one vote and must vote for or against the course of action.

Tradition states that no president may stay after a single term, although there is not law that actually prevents this.

Each of the republics internal offices features it's own domestic departments, taking care of internal affairs for the separately. While each of these have some differences most are very similar thanks to the singular main influence of the Arcerion system.

Legislature
The Legislature in Malentina is split between the upper house of the Senate, and the lower houses of the three republican assemblies, The Gathering of the West, The House of Commons and the Northern Assembly. The lower houses work separately from each other for domestic legislation for the confederate members, but meet up together to form the lower house, usually referred to simply as the Parliament, during a one month in the spring and one month in the autumn to take care of confederate legislation.

The Senate is chosen from important and powerful individuals mainly from the old aristocracy, the not-quite-as-old political families from the revolutionary era as well as academics and businessmen. While the senate was originally created with the idea that they would have great limitations to their powers to propose new laws and resolutions, their influence has slowly grown over time, mainly as a result of presidential actions and corruption. Even though proposals by the senate must pass through the Parliament, it is very common for these proposals to be approved without even being discussed. On the other while at first the proposals from the Parliament were traditionally always approved, they now more often find themselves being rejected by the senate.

The lower houses are simple elected positions, usually through a common party system, each of which has it's own number of seats and domestic responsibilities. This causes difficulties as although the houses have differing number of members under the Treaty of the New Confederation they must each have an equal amount of voting power in the combined lower house. This has caused many issues including the perception of the fairness of parliamentary decisions and the counting of votes.

Local governance
Malentinan municipalities hold a great deal of local power and create even more complications which has allowed the spread of sever corruption in some of these local jurisdictions.

Culture
The culture of Malentina is a complicated intertwining of the various tribes who inhabited the islands before the arrival of the first colonists from the east, the coscivian-sarpic colonists who made the first settlements on the islands, the aenglo-carnish immigrants who had the most cultural footprint, and the mestizo populations who fall somewhere in between them all. Although large parts of these groups have integrated and melded with each other there are still parts of the nation that work to maintain the old traditions of their culture of origin.

One of the most impactful components of Malenti culture, based in ideas from the earliest tribes, is a focus on nightly activities. Almost all holidays in Malentina are celebrated between dusk and dawn. The focus on leisure happening after dark goes far further however. In Malentina it is actually quite typical for sleep to be divided between a longer nightly rest and a shorter daily one, with the most common division being six-to-two hours. This is also supported by most stores and workplaces to close for a few hours around noon, with work being divided between the morning and afternoon. While the previous behaviors vary greatly across the nation and is less common on the eastern coast one thing that is true almost everywhere is a post-dusk nightly meal eaten just before going to bed.

Cuisine
Food in Malentina is heavily focused on a mixture of large variations of fish, crustaceans, large insects and lambs, served with corn cooked in a variety of ways as well as a number of local spices.

Demographics
Malentina is a nation that suffers from a combination of too much cultural, religious and ideological diversity, leading to a nation only loosely held together by the inequality of power between the average citizen and the ruling class. Only through the support of radical elements to maintain a loyal military is the ruling body able to keep the nation together.

Religious Demographics
Most of Malentina follows some variation of the Carnish Anglican church. Although the largest portion follows traditional Anglicanism, more than half of all anglican followers are part of smaller divergent branches, only one of which, the Anglic-Samuelites, is even close to comparing to the main branch.

Outside of the Anglican followers, the nation is mostly split between the various native beliefs. These beliefs developed mostly separately from the mainland religions because of the isolation of the island tribes. Wakabiism is therefore a group of beliefs and ideas only found on the islands, although it shares many similarities to other animist concepts of the coastal regions surrounding the Malentine Sea.

Wakabiism is split into three main groupings, with some smaller outliers most of which are slowly dying out. These focus on animist worship mainly focus on a few particular ideas. These include ancestral deification, the display of gratitude for both the natural elements such as plants and animals when harvesting them plus the people who harvested them for you, as well as the study and use of the phase of the moon and the position of the stars for use in religious guidance, the tracking of time and holiday ceremonies as well as astrological implications for the destinies of newborn.

The largest of the Wakabii branches is the Neomaalit branch, which is a reformed branch focused on implementing nationalistic and socialist ideas into the old religious ideas. These ideas include more conservative ideas such as the equity of the citizenry of the nation and the heavy taxation and regulation of international entities working within the nation. Some also hold more radical ideas such as the freeing of the nation from it's imperialist ruling class as well as a complete shift towards a fully planned economy. Even though the partaking in this group is still considered treason against the Confederation according to the Treaty that created the modern government, the enforcement of this policy has lost all it's power. At this point there is even political parties with seats in the parliament who not only espouse this position but actively campaign as it's representatives.

The other two main Wakabii branches, the Tinastii and Maalit, both hold much vaguer beliefs and ideas. Today for most of their followers they function more as philosophical guidelines to helping followers live a righteous and good life rather than a strict religious code. One of the few core ideas held among almost all of their followers however is a strong rejection of the Neomaalit as a group of desecrating heretics who actively corrupt the true path of the faithful.

While the Irreligious only make up 1.6% of the Malentinan population, they make up 21% of the top 1% most wealthy individuals. The irreligious demographic used to be closer to 7%, but they were one of the most heavily affected groups by the post-revolution cleansing, leading to the majority of them either fleeing or becoming victims of the crime.

Economy
Malentina as a whole is mainly an agricultural economy with exports focused on sugar, liquor and tobacco. This agricultural sector has moved back and forth between producing enough food for the nation to be self-sustaining.

The nation also maintains a steady mining sector, mainly focused on cheap metals like nickle and zinc. The islands used to produce a good amount of paper products in the 19th and 20th centuries but a combination of deforestation and preservation efforts have almost wiped this sector out completely.

The islands also happen to be a great place to catch large amounts of high value crustaceans as well as other fishing products to a lesser extent.

While the nation still largely relies on hydrocarbons for energy generation thanks to it's very flat geography improved further by the reduction in forested areas the islands are perfect for wind-power turbines. At this point they have successfully implemented enough turbines to make up 17% of their electrical output, with plans laid to double this by the end of 2040.

Military
The Malentinan military is a shadow of it's former self. A nation who ones heavily focused on their ability to project naval power and punch enough above their weight to actually have the ability to contest other nations in their region now only maintains a pretty basic land military force with a complete lack of military tradition and suspected of large-scale corruption.

The only military institution that may deter external invaders is the Lunar Revolutionary Guard, a reservist force built on the old guerilla tactics used by the islands natives since pre-colonial times. They remained the greatest obstacle for international intervening forces, especially League forces from beyond Crona. during the White Death War. By using the islands heavy vegetation as well as tunneling systems as cover, while utilizing a mixture of traps, night-time ambushes and raids on logistics to make the war a living hell for the occupying forces.