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Good evening Belgium,

It is with great pleasure that I am here to address you. As you may have already known, I am running for CP in January and while you already had the opportunity to read about my plans in Jarabe de Patu’s excellent article positioning the two CP candidates, I’d like to use this article to once again refresh you on my plans for the presidency as well as take the opportunity to present you some faces of my cabinet if you grant me the confidence of leading this nation.


On the economy

It should be clear by now, that we are going to hold up our current concession deals with our international partners. They remain our most important financial income and my cabinet shall work to continuously uphold those arrangements. Our tax income, while impressive, is shadowed by our concessions income so I do not expect to move much in terms of taxes.

To refresh you on our budget, our biggest expenses are going to be:
• The BHA, as it currently stands, with around 1 million BEF set aside each month to finance the program every week. The requirement will mostly remain the same, although we’re still going to look into ways to tie the programs into showing increased activity, be it in media, the comments or on our Discord.
• The renewed BAF (Belgian Air Force), of which around 400k to 500k BEF will be put at disposal of our players for air fights. We’re looking at distributing around 600 q5 food daily as well as a weekly cash reward of 5k for reaching its requirements. This measure will primarily focus on younger players.
It is important to mention that this budget is preliminary and will highly depend on our actual income as well as the number of players participating in these two programs. So, don't be surprised if we need to tweak the programs to deal with demand. I also would like to thank Curlybear for providing Belgium with the air supplies these last years out of his own pocket. It was a tremendous help for our players and a very good program to keep up. Therefore, our decision to nationalise it and re-adapt it into the BAF.

Regarding the rest of our budget:
• 30k BEF will be held back to sign eventual MPPs with our partner countries and the remaining funds will be used to fund Trivia Nights and Media Contests organised by our government. It is our hope to incentivise increased activity with fun programs while also offering potential rewards.
• A reserve of 300k-400k will be kept so that Belgium is prepared for emergency funding in case of war, to cover certain emergency expenses that are deemed necessary but also to finance events that coincide with ingame events. That way, we hope to use the increased activity from the ingame events to also push our players to be more active and participate with extra rewards.

The budget will serve to support our players fighting ability, as well as incentivize activity. They are kept simple to not overwhelm our younger players. I do not believe that offering loans to players to build up their industry will help Belgium. In my eyes, it's a risk and would also pressure players to pay back those loans and force them to invest in areas that need to be profitable. Since the economic system is not as easy to understand, especially for new players and the cost to invest and the time to get those costs back quite long, I believe this would hurt us more than benefit us.

I also believe that the players should be free to choose where they want to place their companies and what and how they want to build them. Providing them with money would pressure them in making choices that are good for the government and not necessarily good for the player. Our hope is that, by taking care of food supplies and the costs of housing, the player will be able to set money aside and invest it.


On military and foreign affairs

We shall continue our current Training Wars if our partners agree to uphold them. It is important to offer our players an opportunity for daily fights. I can assure that our fights will start regularly and that our fighters will be informed in case of emergencies. Our partners can also count on our cooperation and will always have an open ear in case of talks. This government prides itself on activity.

The cabinet will continue to follow its neutrality policy. We realize that Belgium has always and will continue to rely on outside help to survive potential attacks. Remaining neutral and away from alliance politics will help us avoid any problematic situations. Our concessions are also helped by our neutrality and our willingness to talk with each nation no matter their allegiance.


On society and education

There will be weekly articles by our main national ORG detailing the events of the past week as well as the expenses and participation of our programs. These articles will also allow our players to ask us questions that we shall make sure to answer to the best of our ability. Nevertheless, each member of government will be available to our players outside of those weekly updates. We’re active in-game as well as on Discord for any questions.

Regarding our newer players, we want to include the Ministry of Education. The MoEd will publish tutorials and be the first person of contact for our new players. Our goal is to adapt the welcome message in those regards and to help young players. Our programs will also prioritize them. The tutorials will then be published on the BIESD website for easy access to find all necessary information.

Yet another goal is increased activity: Thanks to Trivia Nights, Media Competitions and potential fighting events where we as players come together. We shall look to maybe finance such programs with our reserve funds or through private donations to increase our camaraderie. Adding activity requirements to our help programs also looks like a promising path to incentivize increased activity and participation in our little community.

Lastly, in regard to immigration, we want to give Congress the ability to clear immigration concerns through a Congressional Committee with proportional representatives of the parties. Their job is to debate and decide about Applications, and a vote from the Committee Members will prove Applications. The Committee will appoint a Chairman whose job is to talk to the applicant, as well as do further inquiries into his citizenship request and talk to Belgian citizens that can testify.

The Chairman will be responsible to start and close votes as well as give the authorization to accept applications once the Committee has voted in favour of accepting any application. This should not only increase the activity and importance of Congress but also provide safer immigration by allowing for background checks and personal responsibility from Congress members. We hope to also see increased activity from Congress as the second branch of the political game.


Me, myself and I

Before we get to the Cabinet, a little bit about myself for those who don’t know who I am. I joined the game in June of 2012 and quickly became part of the community in Belgium, beginning my political career as Ambassador and then onwards to Foreign Affairs and Defence positions in several cabinets. I’ve also been Country President several times and was Minister of Foreign Affairs for a year straight, back then positioning us in an alliance called PLUTO, which I also helped lead as Secretary General and Public Relations Officer.

After that, I emigrated to the eUSA and became active in their government as a Public Relations Officer before leaving the game entirely. I returned a few months ago to active duty. I also was several times Chairman of Congress, Immigration officer, leader of the Belgian Training Academy and together with Curlybear, re-wrote the former Constitution of Belgium. You can read much more of my life in my wiki-page if you are interested.


Cabinet

At this point, the cabinet consists of the following people, although this is also preliminary. We want to offer opportunities to players who are interested in learning about things, so we encourage you all to participate in politics through Congress and the government. We have an open ear..

Country President: MCKitkat
Ministry of Economy and Finance: Curlybear
Ministry of Foreign Affairs: MCKitkat and Curlybear
Ministry of Defense: Gyantse
Ministry of Education: Jarabe de Patu
Special Advisor to the Cabinet: Director9

Thank you all for reading and keep praising our lord and saviour Taylor Swift!