The Cape

Federacy of the Cape Restarka do Kabo
Flag Coat of arms
Motto: Soberania pertes incondicionala a povo! "Sovereignty belongs unconditionally to the people!"
Anthem: Levante a Standart "Raise the Banner"
Location of the Cape (dark green)
Capital and largest city	Cape Town
Official languages	Cape Coscivian
Recognised national languages	Kiravic Coscivian, Cartadanian, Cahokian
Government	Federal parliamentary constitutional republic
• President	Manley Mann AFC President Kifer Parmeli Jair Sutra Roberto Rosa
• Prime Executive	Kil Furey
• Marshal of the Stanera	Nancy Pellise
• Auditor-General	Mitch Whalen
Legislature	National Parliament
• Upper house	National Auditorium
• Lower house	National Stanera
Independence from Kiravia and Cartadania
• Declaration of the Federacy	October 7, 1891
• Occupation of the Cape	May 12, 1938
• Republican restoration	October 7, 1951
Population
• Estimate	127,912,766
GDP (nominal)	estimate
• Total	$4.51 trillion
• Per capita	$35,544
HDI (2021)	0.921 very high
Currency	Cape Saer (₴)
Driving side	right

The Cape, officially the Federacy of the Cape, is the easternmost country in Crona. It is bordered on the north, east, and south by the Odeneru and Cathay Oceans. It covers 2.3 million kms2 and has over 127 million people, largely concentrated in its namesake Cape Peninsula. The Cape is a multiethnic and multicultural society, with a majority of the population having mixed ancestry between the country's three primary ethnic groups, Kiravian, Cartadanian, and Cronan. The capital and largest city is Cape Town, which concurrently serves as one of seven provincial capitals.

For thousands of years, the Cape was home to various indigenous peoples. In the 1600s, however, Cartadanian and Kiravian explorers began to settle the country's eastern coast. Their colonies and dominions would expand throughout the 18th and 19th centuries. Disputes over political representation and forced colonial assimilation would lead to the Capetian War of Independence in 1887, led by Melvyn Kalma and the nascent Republican Nationalist Party, which established independence in 1891. The tumultuous young republic, weakened by political violence and rampant power struggles following Kalma's death in 1922, was invaded and occupied by the Kingdom of Palastra during the Great War. A Reclamation war soon took place, re-establishing the republic in 1951. A slow series of reforms throughout the 1980s would transition the state from a one-party military dictatorship to a representative democracy - with the country entering into a rapid period of economic growth and industrialization that continued into the early 21st century.

The Cape today is a federal parliamentary constitutional republic, with a non-executive president serving as head of state and a Prime Executive serving as head of government. Although reforms have disestablished the one-party rule of the Republican Nationalist Party in favour of a nominally multi-party system, the RNP and its Restarkist ideology still dominate the political landscape. The country ranks as a semi-democracy in the Liberty Index and is categorized as an authoritarian democracy. The Cape is a key member of numerous international organizations such as the League of Nations.

The Cape is a regional power with a growing economy and a highly developed market. Traditionally fuelled by the state-led exploitation of natural resources, manufacturing, and international shipping, the economy has grown significantly in its service sector during the past three decades - with no small part due to foreign investment. Cape Town ranks as one of the most economically active and important urban areas in Crona, home to the continent's largest stock and commodity exchanges by market capitalization. The nation has high levels of economic freedom yet maintains numerous state-provided social services, ranking highly on continental indicators of education, health care, and human development.

Etymology

The Cape is named after the Cape Peninsula and its landmark Cape of the Segunda Cabeça. As a great cape, seen as the final waypoint between the Odeneru and the Cathay, sailors, and settlers began to refer to it as simply "the Cape.” The name stuck, and the Kiravian colony that would eventually exist took on the name Axerka Kesta (literally "cape colony"). The Cape is one of a handful of countries in which the definite article is used in its English-language name.

History

Indigenous peoples

A depiction of the city-state of Cahokia in ~1350.

It has been accepted that the first humans to settle the lands of the Cape arrived at least 12,000 years ago. Indigenous peoples in the Cape today can trace their ancestry to those groups, the two most significant being the Cahokian and Anahuak peoples.

Throughout history, those Indigenous societies became increasingly complex. By Occidental colonization, many cultures included permanent settlements, hierarchical states, and advanced agricultural techniques. Although it is difficult to estimate the Indigenous population of the Cape at the time of Occidental colonization, the generally accepted number is between 700,000 and 4 million; with the modern Federacy's Executive of Culture recognizing a figure of 2.4 million.

Initial contact between Occidental settlers and the various Indigenous states and commonwealths was relatively peaceful. Those of Indigenous mixed descent played a vital role in establishing Kiravian colonies and trade connections. Indigenous relations with Kiravian Capetians remained strong until independence. However, conflict quickly arose with the Cartadanian settlers, who, starting in the 18th century, began to conquer Indigenous states and attempted to assimilate them into their culture. Such actions reached a peak before the War of Independence, with forced integrations and deportations.

Occidental colonization

The restored Marble Emperor statue in Cape Town.

The first documented arrival of Occidentals in the Cape was on Christmas of 1612, by Cartadanian conquistadors. In 1616, Kiravian explorers arrived, erecting a crude effigy of the Marble Emperor on the southern tip of the Cape Peninsula and declaring the establishment of Cape Town. Settlers to the “city” would only truly arrive a decade later. Cartadanian settlers established the permanent settlement of Sao Suro in 1621. These two cities would serve as the heart of the Cape’s fur and gold trades and soon became the respective capitals of Kiravia’s Cape Colony and Cartadania’s Natalia Colony. Skirmishes would break out between the two colonies in the 1670s, culminating in the Great Beaver War, fought over to control the fur trade and the Indigenous states surrounding the colonies.

The East Oriental, off the coast of Cape Town, 1771.

Fleeing turmoil in the nascent Cartadanian Republic, much of Cartadania’s wealthy left for Natalia. A coup, led by the newly-arrived upper class, took place in 1697 during the republic’s tumultuous Red Year. This coup deposed the former colonial administration for an oligarchic corporate administration. The 17th century would see a de-facto independent Natalia annex the Indigenous statelets surrounding it in the Cahokian Wars; first subjugating, then assimilating the Indigenous people. Such acts came to the chagrin of the new Federative Republic of Cartadania, although any solid police action was found unfeasible by the new Cartadanian Congress.

New arrivals from Kiravia, largely lower-class, peasant farmers and middle-class merchants, settled Cape Colony starting in the 1700s. Throughout the 18th century, Cape Town became an important trading port for the Alshar spice trade and the gateway to Crona's abundant gold, resource, and fur trade. Some of the earliest mixed-race communities developed during that time in Cape Town. Relations between Cape Colony and the surrounding Indigenous peoples were relatively cordial compared to their relations with the Natalia colony. However, they were likewise annexed to halt the growth of the Natalian sphere of influence through the Treaties of 1792, which granted Kiravia control over their foreign policies.

Despite continuous immigration, by the 1870s, only a tiny minority of Cape Colony’s population had been born overseas. Such distance from Great Kirav allowed the development of a unique, Capetian culture and self-governance measures. At the same time, the situation in Natalia became untenable - by the 1880s, the colony’s working-class and Indigenous populations were soon on the brink of open revolution.

Independence and confederation

National Revolutionary Army fighters, 1887.

The opening of the first convocation of the National Parliament, 1888.

The Praça da Colônia massacre (1886) in Natalia, where thousands of Indigenous and working-class protestors were shot dead by government forces, prompted the establishment of the National Revolutionary Army (NRA) - whose chapters quickly popped up across both colonies. Under Melvyn Kalma, a prominent advocate for independence and decorated former general in the Kiravian Foreign Legion, a War of Independence was waged starting March of 1887 to overthrow both colonial governments and to unite the peninsula under a new state.

By June of 1887, following major uprisings in Cape Town, Kiravia exited the Cape. The NRA’s provisional government was recognized provided the new state remained a Kiravian ally and allowed the continuation of Kiravian trade. The transition of statehood from Cape Colony to the Capetian Provisional Government was formalized on June 22, 1887. By 1888, Natalia’s Indigenous population was in open revolt, with most local chiefs and leaders pledging allegiance to the NRA. “Liberating the peoples of Natalia” became official policy at the first convocation of the National Parliament. The invasion of Natalia would conclude in February of 1891. On October 7, the newly formed Federacy of the Cape was declared the successor state to both Cape Colony and Natalia, with Melvyn Kalma serving as the first Prime Executive.

Melvyn Kalma (left), the first Prime Executive of the Cape.

Kalma subsequently introduced many reforms, such as secularizing the state, establishing a period of redress for the Indigenous peoples, and instituting industrializing reforms with the goal of transforming the Cape into a modern, Occidental nation state, governed as a constitutional republic with a secular constitution. To this end, the political activities of the NRA were separated into the civilian Republican Nationalist Party - which was to govern the country under a single-party period of tutelage until such reforms were complete. Following the establishment of the Federacy, certain groups in the former Natalia, both upper and working-class, became discontent with Kalma's reforms. Anti-secularist and anti-tutelage/pro-democracy (the Kadets Rebellion) revolts broke out in 1897 and 1911, respectively, which were suppressed with military force.

20th century

After Kalma’s death in 1922, the reformist-dominated RNP considered the Cape sufficiently developed to exit the period of political tutelage, beginning the first multi-party period of the Federacy of the Cape. Four major parties contested the 1924 elections: the Communist Party, the Constitutional Democrats (Kadets), the Levantine fascist Lusophone Worker’s Front, and the Republican Nationalist Party. The RNP was controversially returned as the majority with a margin of barely one percent - with the months following being permeated with brutal street fighting between Republican, Kadet, Front, and Communist militias. The communist Makhi Anso was

Politics and government

The Houses of the National Stanera.

The Federacy of the Cape is a federal parliamentary constitutional republic, comprised of seven provinces in a symmetric federation. The Capetian political system operates under the 1951 Federal Constitution, with the document’s Fundamental Statutes - the articles concerning the republican system, fundamental rights, and the rule of law - held as invoiable.

Since the 1980s, the Cape has been fundamentally structured as a multi-party parliamentary representative democracy. The bicameral National Parliament, comprised of the 503-member National Stanera and the 28-member National Auditorium, serves as the country’s legislature; and holds primacy over the other branches of the federal government. Deputies to both houses are elected every four years, who in turn elect the President of the Federacy, who serves as the head of state and commander-in-chief of the armed forces. The member of the National Stanera who can obtain the confidence of a majority of the lower house is appointed by the President to act as the Prime Executive, who serves as the head of government. The Supreme Tribunal of the Federacy serves as the nation’s supreme and constitutional court, with the powers to interpret laws, mediate disputes, and to ensure the constitutionality of politics and legislation.

Universal suffrage for all races and genders has been in place without interruption since 1924; all Capetian citizens aged 18 or above are granted the right to vote.

Politics

The big-tent Republican Nationalist Party has been the dominant party in Capetian politics since 1951. Although it is no longer the only legal party and now competes with other parties - namely the Constitutional Democrats, the Humanists - Social Democrats, and the Liberal Democratic Party - on a nominally equal footing, the RNP has continued to win large majorities in every election and has ruled uninterrupted since democratization. The party continues to leverage the resources it cultivated during the single-party period to remain in power, for example, through its large membership, control of the nation’s largest labour union, and the practising of populism and constant reform expressed through its quadrennial nationwide open primary elections. In the past 30 years, the party has become divided between multiple factions; each catering to a separate segment of the big-tent.

Since the founding of the republic, the dominant political current in Capetian politics has been Restarkism - support for Kalma’s reforms. Restarkism, enshrined as the country's constitutional guiding ideology and the RNP's ideology, supports a form of nationalist democracy with a secular constitution and an Occidental, liberal culture (centre-right politics). Restarkism likewise emphasizes state intervention in the economy and the provision of state services in the pursuit of national unity, equality, and social welfare (centre-left politics).

The armed forces have intervened in politics in defence of the Restarkist status-quo multiple times since Kalma's death - most recently in the 2021 Cape coup d'état. Military involvement on behalf of Restarkism, or occasionally on behalf of Parliament, has become an institutionalized part of the political system; to the point where the populace is no longer uniformly averse to coups, with many welcoming the ejection of governments they perceived as unconstitutional.

The combination of a dominant-party system, a constitutional guiding ideology, and the frequent participation of the armed forces in politics has led to the Cape's description as an authoritarian democracy.

Military

Nuclear weapons and the Cape Commission for the Preservation of the Republic