Elisa Vorimberg - A Presidential Candidate!
Elisa Vorimberg
Hello citizens of eGermany,
For those of you that don't know me, I'm Elisa Voribmerg, I'm in my 4th congress term, I served as minister of foreign affairs for Starkad's second term, and I am currently co-minister of foreign affairs. I started the game in Brandenburg and have only stepped foot out of Germany when we lost our last region. I have decided that I now wish to run for country president, and the Freie Deutsche Demokraten party has gratiously given me their nomination! (yey for the FDD!)
I realize it is a bit irregular to be running for president while being a member of my opponent's administration, but I have talked about it with Gobba and we agreed that a little healthy competition is a good thing.
Here is my platform and intentions for what to do as president:
The single largest problem facing eGermany, is underpopulation.
According to this site, Germany has over 55million internet users!
This is in sharp contrast with Indonesia with 25million internet users, and Poland with 20million internet users.
If we use Poland as the ratio of internet users to erepublik population, Germany should have ~21 thousand citizens, enough to become by far the biggest superpower in the eWorld! Instead we currently have just over 1 thousand citizens (with ~500 more in occupied regions and still in exile). This is unacceptable and we must work to change it!
My plan is to contact German newspapers and major blogs -- telling them about erepublik so they can write an article about it. Other countries have been able to get thousands of new citizens with a single newspaper article.
We need at least 2-3 thousand more citizens if we are going to be strong enough to defend ourselves.
As for any alliance, it would be irresponsible to immediately join any alliance right now. I will continue our pro-peace attitude, and our friendship with Canada, but avoid membership in any alliance for now.
Another issue is the current terrible communication between the administration, congress, and the people.
This was a huge problem for Starkad during his presidency, he neglected to write any newspaper articles or show any sign that there was an operational government during the invasion. Gobba has improved from that, but there is still a lot more room for improvement, especially when it comes to communication with congress.
As for the language debate, I don't think this will be solved easily. Those that don't speak German are not any less loyal to Germany, sure there might be a slightly higher risk that they might be a spy, but that is no reason to exclude them from politics! Especially with our low population, it would be very damaging to close Germany off from immigrants and people of German heritage that want to be in eGermany. But on the other side, German is the native language and should not be banned.
My solution to this issue is to create a new government organization providing free translations to newspapers in Germany.
As for congress and the administration, for now I don't think any rules need to be made for now.
One of the most significant points of my presidency, will be to reform the government.
Germany has been and essentially still is an Authoritarian government, especially in the last 2 months where was no active or responsive congress. (which was proven in May with this, and in June when there were almost no congress members whatsoever posting at all). Without an active congress the administration became increasingly internal. even tax discussions got moved into the higher levels of the administration, where everything is supposed to be top-secret.
While this was really the only way for out government to function at that time, we have an active and eager congress right now. Congress should not be given the same information as the average citizen. My plan is this:
1. Close off the congressional forum from being publicly viewable. The idea here is to make it so that congress can be given more information than the average citizen.
2. Create a formal and written constitution (with congress approval) to clearly decide what powers congress has, and what powers the president and ministers have.
3. As part of the constitution, a procedure will be made about de-classifying government discussions once they are concluded and no longer important to our national security.
I realize that the current congress is fairly new and inexperienced, but with a little guidance I think they are capable of making some decisions. I am confident that they will learn quickly.
Next is the ever-present transparency debate. I will not promise total transparency, simply because that is not a possibility given the number of threats we face and we need to keep a significant amount of information away from our enemies.
However, I think there should be a responsible hierarchy of information:
The president and ministers - information of vital and immediate importance to our national security.
Congress - information that the government has that is not of vital and immediate importance to our national security.
The Citizens - Declassified government discussions and frequent newspaper announcements by the different ministries and congress.
This will give us an reasonable transparency goal that will allow us to fight wars, and also keep a good and responsible flow of information between all the divisions of the government, and the people.
I also intend to re-build each ministry to meet new standards of efficiency and speed. Some of you might have heard of the USA's total restructure of their ambassadors? I created a system similar to that about 1.5 months ago, during the height of our issues with Sweden. I turned 5 ambassadors with no organization or communication into a highly efficient foreign ministry with ~30 staff members, providing myself and the president with a constant feed of information (in addition to the normal relationship building with each of the 30 countries that the staff covers).
I am very proud of my work there, and I want to bring such positive change to each of the ministries.
With all that concluded, I hope you will now be able to make an informed decision about who you want as your leader.
-Elisa Vorimberg
P.S. I am always available for interviews or questions from you. Send me a PM in-game or send me a message on the eGermany-irc or forum.
Comments
FIRST
VOTED
YOU are the best
Voted, hope you win! I know you will do great things for Germany!
*Vote
I support gobba but it's ok if we have a little democracy...
I sincerely like your program. Although for next month, my vote goes to Gobba so we can finish some projects that have been started, but I would say you certainly have my vote for the August elections. We desperately need a lot of things you proposed in your article.
Voted and I hope you win. My support is with you.
@Habraka
Just because Gobba started projects doesn't been they will end just because of a change in administration.
Habraka, if the projects are good for Germany I would certainly not end them.
I know, it's just that some projects are complicated and transferring them to a new president would be to time consuming to get up to speed.
Besides, I do believe Gobba is doing a good job, we work together quite well, and I believe he deserves a second term after all the work he has done for Germany lately.
He is extremely active, and takes his job very serious. Just last night we had war game negotiations till like 3:30 AM, while he was planning to go to bed like two hours earlier. When I need to talk with him (which is a couple of times every single day), he is usually online and active to answer.
Gobba isn't perfect, I'll be the first to admit that, but no one is. He's going a darn good job, we work together very well, and I believe he can do much more for Germany next term.
That being said, I also believe in you Elisa, and I am convinced you can also bring positive change to Germany. As I personally want to stick to the 'two-term limit rule for presidents', I will not be supporting Gobba for a third term out of principle. So for the August elections, you get my support.
If you would happen to win the July elections, I hope we can work together as good as Gobba and me are doing now, and that you can accomplish as many of your goals for Germany 😉.
Good luck, and whatever Germany decides, Gobba or you, it will be a good choice. Vote smart, vote eGerman.
I wish all candidates good luck, and a fair competition.
May the best happen for our country.
Voted
voted
@Habraka
Obama was in the transferring process for how long for an entire real world nation?
Active, Elisa is on at all hours of the day AND night. I would pretty accurately say more than 3x the time Gobba puts in.
Like I said, I'm sure that Elisa is up for the task, it's just for me personally I would prefer giving Gobba a second term first. Besides, I'm only one citizen, one vote. Germany as a whole will decide in a couple of days, and I wish both candidates good luck 😉.
good luck Elisa😁
I first wanna see ur pics on the ePlayboy Elisa! Maybe i would vote for u then... 😉
Imagine the popularity-boost u could get by an appearence in the ePlayboy! 😉
I am so voting for Elisa these elections.
Elisa and Gobba are both great picks. I like your idea of a closed congress forum. I will suggest that too in Japan. Good luck Germany.
After reading the article it will be a difficult choice next presidential elections... 🙂
GO Elisa! GObba!
Der Vertrag mit Italien ist zwar nicht schön gewesen und auch andere Punkte sind einer Verbesserung würdig. Doch momentan würde ich mich eher für Gobba aussprechen. 🙂
Good plan, but I hope you will vote for me on this presidential elections!
Hail Poland!
Hail Germany!
@Vernichter
Für das, was?
?
This election will be the first that I'm not 100% sure on where my vote goes. I wish all candidates the best of luck!
Yeah, we got 2 very nice candidates here!
Voted.
Hail Elisa
U should win.
voted
VOTEEEDDDDDD
GO ELISA!!!!!!!!
and hey ekszer 😛
done
i am not a germany citizen but i hope you will win
All HAIL ELISA!