Hōu Zhanaland

Hōu Zhanaland, officially the Dominion of Hōu Zhanaland [Akashiren: ホウザナランド, Sikoto: Terangatira, Sundati: Ulawulo kumanweme aSezantsi, Soijiran: Heo Janaku, Dequa: Huóllanalun], is a dominion of the Akashiro Shogunate located at the southernmost point of Talasi, with an area of 17,800 square kilometres (6,873 sq mi) and a population of over two million, making it one of the world's most densely populated countries. Hōu Zhanaland shares land borders with the Tsunojiin Shogunate to the north & west, and the Imperial Republic of Calarith to the east. It shares maritime borders with Yimmuralia through the Gulf of Waimarama, and Aizawa-Natauria along its eastern seaboard. Its capital is Haikato and its second-largest city is Gaaten, as well as a municipal city in Binnebo. 
People groups are believed to have first settled in the region roughly 4000 years ago, as hunter-gatherer groups known informally as the Natanics that eventually developed agricultural technology in the late 2nd millennium BCA. After these peoples were largely dispersed by the Sikoto peoples, the Sikoto would become the majority ethnic group in the region. Its first set of tribal kingdoms was noted in ancient records in the early 1st century ACA. The Sikoto would organise themselves into various tribal kingdoms, occasionally uniting themselves into political superstructures such as the mKweze dynasty in the late 12th century, the baSuto dynasty in the 15th century and the Ma-tuso dynasties in the 18th and early 19th centuries. The latter would be uprooted by Akashiren colonial settlement over the course of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Beginning in 1822 (49 AU), Akashiren colonial companies would gradually expand from the port city surrounding Cape Resolute to eventually claiming a political mandate over the entirety of the Gulf of Waimarama and the local Sikoto-majority interior regions by 1879. 
This would culminate in the Pioneer Column of 1880 and in the Yasuda Agreements of 1892 (67 AU), which divided the Sikoto homelands (as well as Azrael) between Tsunojiin, Calarith & the Akashiren colonies, resulting in the expansion of the newly-created Colony of Hōu Zhanaland, which had been established four years prior in 1888. Mounting protests, mainly surrounding the existence of "minority rule" established in the Colony of Sundatano and other colonial settlements which restricted the ability of the non-white peoples of the colonies to partake in their governance resulted in a series of colonial conferences throughout the late 1800s and early 1900s ACA, eventually culminating in the Act of Federation 1909 (85 AU) which formalised the merger of the colonies of Hōu Zhanaland & Sundatano into a singular dominionship under Akashiro the following year. 
==Etymology ==
The term 'Hōu Zhanaland' originates from the Edict of Colonial Settlement 1886, which outlined the requirement for a secondary settlement along the "southern shores of the continent". This portion of the edict was eventually directly transcribed to form the name of Hōu Zhanaland, with 'Hōu' meaning 'new' and 'Zhanan' meaning 'south shores'. The name was designed to be easily translated into other scripts. Similarly to Sundatano, which is an exonym originating from the Akashiren term スンダダニオ, or 'Sunda-danio' which - the official Akashiren term for the Sikoto designated upon the first contact of the two states in the 15th century, translating to 'dark people of the underland', Hōu Zhanaland is an exonym, but one which can be loosely translated and has been gradually incorporated into the other language groups of the nation, such as Binnebo.
The Sikoto people groups use the term Terangatira to describe the country, which is often cited as a potential alternative to Hōu Zhanaland, which many view as a colonial term placed upon the native peoples.
==History==
===Prehistory===
Hōu Zhanaland would spend much of the world's history attached to the mainland of Southern Talasi, not being split off from the mainland until roughly 108,000 years ago. As a result, the island of Waimarama (which modern Haikato is built on) would stay mostly separate from the happenings on the mainland until the end of the most recent Talasi Greenhouse Event, after which the planet of Abexilas would cool and ice bridges would form over time between the mainland & Waimarama. Modern-day Sundatano's earliest inhabitants were hunter-gatherers, such as the Natani people. According to archaeological dating of artefacts and skeletal materials, Natanic speakers first settled in the Sundati highlands between in the 2300s BCA, during the last years of the most recent Talasi Greenhouse Event. Natani-speaking people would develop agricultural methods in the 13th century BCA, beginning a series of migrations from equatorial regions to Sundatano around until as late as 450 BCA. Sikoto people settled at the coastal regions and the interior between 250 BCA and 500 ACA. The advancement of Sikoto people groups into the interior dispelled much of the Natani population up into the mountainous highlands beyond the Sudwent River, although some would remain around modern-day Cape Resolute, eventually becoming what is known today as the Sundati peoples.
Over the first and early second millennium ACA, the temperature and general conditions would drop sharply, and much of the south of Talasi would be transformed into a vast taiga woodland, which would be exploited by small Sikoto kingdoms along the southern coast. This drop in temperatures also allowed for more Sikoto & Sundati peoples to travel across to Waimarama, which Sundati tribal groups would mostly take control over by the 6th century ACA. Sikoto contact with the outside world began in 1452 ACA (373 BU) with southeastern trading peoples, including Baszku peoples & Ischanori sailors. and effective colonisation of the region began in 1775 (100 BU) during the Akashiren exploration of the interior by members of the Tigoma Clan, which would result in the establishment of Gaaten in 1822 (3 BU). 
===Colonial rule===
Modern-day Sundatano emerged from the establishment of company rule in Gaaten by ISTAC in 1835 (10 AU), which would be eventually replaced by direct Akashiren colonial rule in 1874 (49 AU). Waimarama, meanwhile, came under the control of first Azrael and then later Cyrndur, which Akashiro nearly came to blows with over the island in 1877. An encounter with the Shackleton Voyage in 1879 (54 AU) would culminate in the designation of Cape Resolute as the formal name for Talasi's southernmost peninsula. Beginning in 1880 (55 AU), colonial expeditionary forces led by expeditionary Tigoma Sudwent would lead a 600-strong force to map out the hinterland beyond Cape Resolute with the goal of claiming the territory surrounding the Cape as under Sundati protection. Sudwent had expressed significant concern surrounding expansionism by regional powers leaving the colony "boxed in". Sudwent's policy was to instead meet the local powers on equal grounds and expand to cover the contested territory before they did. Large flagpoles would be utilised by the group, nicknamed the Pioneer Column, to stake Sundatano's claims in the surrounding region. Local Sikoto tribes expressed considerable outrage in response to the Pioneer Column's claim-staking over their local villages; despite this, many regional groups would claim loyalty to Sundatano on the basis that they were the "lesser of two evils", and their ability to extract considerable concessions from the colonial administration.
This would culminate in separate treaties in 1882 & 1883 (57-8 AU) which outlined the technical separation of the territories of the local tribal lords from the rest of the colonial administration. The formal announcement of the end of the Pioneer Column's in 1884 (59 AU) with the Takushima Concessions creating the 'Sundatano Protectorate' over the newly occupied territories, for eventual future integration into the colonial administration. The efforts of the Column eventually led to the colonial administration deciding to formally contest the establishment of Cyrndur's territorial claims on the neighbouring island territory of Waimarama, whom the colonial administration considered to be under the boundaries of the Sundatano Protectorate.
===Sikoto protests & the Act of Federation===
After the events of the Pioneer Column in the early 1880s, the Akashiren colonial mission was changed to consolidating their existing territories as opposed to the aggressive expansionism of the previous decade. Much of the Sundati colonial ministries were stripped of their military allegiances. In the mid-1880s (60 AU), it was decided upon that in order to manage certain territories, there should be a second colonial entity, specifically to manage the newly-acquired Waimarama. This would eventually culminate in the Edict of Colonial Settlement 1886, forming the Colony of Hōu Zhanaland two years later after the city of Haikato had been properly built up to accommodate colonial management on the same level as Gaaten. Haikato would quickly begin to attract new settlers, resulting in the city gradually growing from a singular port to a small port village by the turn of the 20th century (75 AU). Gaaten's grip over its holdings came to a peak in 1892, with the signing of the Yasuda Agreements consolidating borders in Southern Talasi and cementing Sundatano's legitimacy. 
However, over the course of the decade, the colony would begin to slip increasingly into decline as protests wracked the region over the controversial minority rule policies put in place by the Akashiren settler colonial government. When these boiled over into full-blown political violence in 1902 (77-8 AU), Haikato would intervene, mediating a settlement that pulled back some of the 'White Knight Laws' that enshrined minority rule in law, reducing much of the policies to a regional decision. This dramatically weakened the governing ability of the ministry in Gaaten, however, and subsequently they would approach Hōu Zhanaland with the concept of uniting the two colonies into a single colonial entity. While initially refused by Hōu Zhanaland at first, following two colonial conferences in Tennyoku in 1907 & 1908 (82 & 83 AU) respectively, Haikato would agree to introduce Sundatano into Hōu Zhanaland. This unification gave Hōu Zhanaland the ability to seek dominionship, which was granted in the Act of Federation 1909, which allowed for unification under a new responsible government the following year.
===Early Dominion & the "Silver Age"===
In 1910, Koma Deizu would become the second Prime Minister, and would oversee a population boom in Haikato beginning in early 1914 (84 AU), largely brought on by the fall of Hwaryeong the year prior. Deizu would establish an 'open door policy' for any and all refugee groups seeking shelter to come to Hōu Zhanaland, much to the protest of the Nationals. This allowed a wide range of smaller ethnic groups into the state, mainly settling in Haikato, but a sizeable number of them choosing to move to the Binnebo Territory. In late 1916, the nation experienced an economic boom brought in by the new migrants, allowing the Labour government to nearly quadruple the budget. Despite this immense success, and his likelihood to win the 1918 elections, Deizu stated that he would stand in the next elections, offering his support to whichever Labour candidate would be selected to replace him as party leader. Tigiyuto Akashiro, a relative of the Shogun, would replace Deizu as leader of the Labour Party in the autumn of 1918, shortly before the elections, and won with a revitalised majority in the Huipūti against a National Party reeling from internal collapse and a Liberal Party with an undefined policy agenda. Tigiyuto, despite his political ability, remained a divisive figure in Labour, as he had come over from the mainland only three years prior to winning the highest office in the country. 
He took a much harsher stance on issues that had been on the Labour ballot prior to 1918, but had lacked the political momentum to pass - throughout Deizu's tenure, most members of the Huipūti had been former benefactors of the White Knight Laws or were in support of limited federal intervention of regional lawmaking. After 1918, however, most of the Huipūti was inhabited by an up-and-coming political class that had began their political careers supporting the Sikoto Protest Movement, and led to bipartisan legislature to be passed completely abolishing all forms of segregation on the national and regional level throughout the 1920s, chiefly with the Total Rights Act of 1929 and the later Indigenous Voting Caucus Act of 1931, which removed the controversial poll taxes on native peoples voting in local and national elections. This culminated in an amendment to the Houmi Constitution prohibiting and removing all forms of segregation. Tigiyuto, through his connections in Tennyoku, established new traditions of cooperation with the mainland, and he led the first state visit to Akashiro in 1924. He also paid visit to numerous other nations in Halinn during the Support Labour tour in 1927. The economy drastically picked up pace during the 1920s, and by the later years of the decade marked the beginning of what is now known as the 'Silver Age' - a protracted period of economic prosperity and population growth throughout the late 1920s and 1930s. 
Heading into the next election cycle, however, the Labour Party began trailing in support behind the other candidate parties, as expansion of the franchise had brought out many people who had not voted before to "vote against the establishment" which Labour as a force represented. Instead of protracting the potential loss, Tigiyuto called the election two years early in 1932, and made the controversial decision on the campaign trail to openly state that while he would run for re-election, he would not serve the term; he would instead use his popularity to get Labour another eight years, but resign to let somebody else carry out the term. This turned many undecided voters against voting for Labour, as they knew the candidate on the ballot would not be the one they were really voting for. The result was a humiliating defeat for the incumbents - losing their majority and the bid for national candidacy. The 1932 elections were particularly messy due to the conventions that had to be navigated in order to bring the new government into power. As the Liberal Party lacked a majority both in the Huipūti and in national candidacy, they were forced into coalition building, which led to four months of hurried but acquiescent negotiations in which the National-Liberal Coalition government would take office by the end of summer 1932. 
====Formation of the Coalition & Liberal governance====
Jose Delserre became the first Prime Minister not to come from the "establishment" - that being the collection of individuals from the traditional ruling settler class. While Delserre was a settler by definition, he had been born and raised in Haikato with the majority of the Quageron population to in the late 1890s and early 20th century, and had spent the years leading up to his political career as a lawyer working with the descendant organizations of the Sikoto Protest Movement to secure indigenous rights. Now, as the leader of the Liberal Party, he utilised his history of being ahead of the curve on civil rights to encourage a significant majority of the newly-enfranchised voters to turn out in favour of the Liberals, although a significant population of settler people living in the Sudwentaland Territory narrowly beat the Sikoto voters there in voting for the National Party, giving the Nationals their first ever seat in the Huipūti and putting the Liberals into the coalition with them. 
During the first year of his term, Delserre's Huipūti passed 9 amendments to the Dominion's constitution. These each served to protect personal rights and freedoms, combining with the amendment that ended segregation to form a sort of bill of rights. Jose claimed credit for the latter as he was the one to propose the amendment, although this never received much attention. Due to the quick passing of these amendments, Delserre's administration had already completed all of its goals. This left the government to focus on minor bipartisan bills. During one of these discussions in the latter half of 1936, National Party representative Keisuke Tenanis began to repeatedly act aggressive due to what is now thought to be mental health issues. Delserre called off the Liberal-National Coalition, to which Tenanis responded by saying he was intentionally being uncooperative. After a failed intervention by the rest of the Huipūti, Tenanis walked out. He was never seen again after this, leaving his seat in the government vacant. This left Delserre to form the minority First Liberal Government, which relied on Labour support to pass legislation. Despite the Liberal government's major achievements during its first term in office, it suffered defeat in the 1940 election from a resurgent Labour. 
====Labour revival & Stagflation====
Tigiyuto Akashiro had resigned as the leader of Labour in 1937, and was replaced by Fumaro Hasha, a senior Labour politician from the Deizu era who had been previously discredited for his populist rhetoric. He was deeply critical of the freelance economic policies of the Liberal government both during the Coalition and minority governments throughout the 1930s; while they allowed for unrestricted economic growth, he claimed the lack of checks and balances on the economy made it much more susceptible to issues such as inflation, which Hōu Zhanaland had been struggling with throughout much of the late 1930s, at certain points reaching as high as 12%. Hasha subsequently promised significant deflationary measures during his 1940 campaign, which attracted increased support from areas of the Haikato urban area which had suffered from the decreased purchasing power of their wages, which for most had not increased since the Labour government introduced the minimum wage in 1928. Hasha's support amongst the working class denied the Liberals a significant portion of their voters which they had used to match Labour's performance in the last election. As a result, Labour was able to clench a decisive victory against both Labour and the Nationals at the national level, securing 54% of the vote. In spite of this, they failed to gain the majority of seats, leading to Labour having to rely on Liberal support for legislation. 
Shortly after his election, however, Hasha's health - which had been worsening for over a decade - declined substantially, leading to him being absent from multiple meetings of the Huipūti throughout late 1940 and 1941, and becoming the first Prime Minister to not give a State of the Dominion Address at the beginning of the year in 1941 since its conception in 1923. Despite this, Hasha's administration managed to pass major deflationary measures that decreased the volume of currency in circulation, bringing inflation down to a low of 3-4%. Shortly after this, however, Hasha would die in the final days of 1941 from multiple successive strokes in his sleep after only 13 months in office, leading to his deputy, Sajo Tahiwai, to inherit the premiership. Tahiwai agreed to continue to carry out Hasha's mandate as Prime Minister until he was elected in his own right. During the early days of Tahiwai's premiership, however, the economy began to slow down, ending over a decade of yearly GDP growth above 5% in the second quarter of 1942; most economists set this drop in economic performance as the end of Hōu Zhanaland's Silver Age as the Labour government prioritised job security over lucrative economic growth. 
===The Great Slump & recession===
After Tahiwai won the Labour internal elections in 1943 and formed the Third Labour Government, he began to strip away much of the deflationary measures put in place by Hasha's government, moving back towards a more laissez-faire approach to economic policy with a greater resemblance to the Liberal government than his Labour government. He continued to raise social security spending, and gradually began decreasing defence spending, leading to a spat with the Nationals over Labour's previous commitments to the "national defence state" programs of the Deizu & Tigiyuto governments, where Tahiwai emphasised his desire to take Labour in a new direction from the protectionist policies of his predecessors. Despite the less hands-on approach to the economy, Tahiwai continued to ensure that the economy did not grow at the cost of higher inflation, leading to a situation where the economy continued to grow, but at a gradually slower rate each quarter, as inflation began to gradually rise from the end of 1945. 
Sajo Tahiwai also lifted economic restrictions, allowing for bonds in the national currency, the Hōu Zhanaland Dollar (HZ$) to be bought by foreign investors. Shortly after this, the number of bonds in HZ$ skyrocketed, and the price of a bond began to gradually increase above the real value of the currency. By the end of 1946, despite economic growth continuing to stagnate and inflation rising, the price of bonds continued to increase, overvaluing the HZ$ by up to 80%. This bubble only inflated further throughout 1947, with the Currency & Asset Bond Bubble reaching up to 450% above real value by the summer of 1947, as investors began handing out bonds based off an assumed economic boom that was impossible to achieve, leaving all of the bonds unable to reach maturity. When the bubble was exposed by the Third Quarter Papers in autumn of the same year, it burst, and the economy crashed into a full-blown recession by the end of 1947, with the GDP growth rate hitting an all-time low in the final quarter of 1947 of -5.6%. Investors conducted multiple runs on the HZ$, leading to value of the dollar to crash and for inflation to skyrocket to over 50% & unemployment to reach 22% of the population by the beginning of 1948. The period during the late 1940s and early 1950s is now referred to by economists as the Great Recession, and would take multiple successive governments to recover fully from the effects of the crash after Tahiwai and two other Labour ministers controversially met with the Governor-General in autumn 1947 to dissolve the Third Labour Government and pass off governance to the Liberals, who had been in Opposition since 1940. 
The Great Recession, 1947-1950s
File:HZ Economic Growth Projections, 1943-1948.png|Quarterly economic growth projections showing the sudden decline in 1947.
File:HZ$ Exchange rates, 1943-1948.png|Exchange rate graph showing the Currency Asset Bubble between 1945 and 1947.
File:HZ$ Inflation Rates, 1943-1948.png|Graph displaying the sudden inflation rate increase as a result of the runs on the HZ$ during the Recession.
 Jose Delserre was invited to form a Second Liberal Government to oversee the economic recovery. He declared his status as an "acting Prime Minister" and that he considered himself to not be serving as Prime Minister, but rather remaining as a member of the Huiputi; despite this, he still assumed the roles and duties of the Prime Minister until the expiration of his term. Within the first few days back in office, Delserre announced that the Haikato Exchange would immediately stop printing currency as a deflationary measure, in order to curb the high inflation rate. After this, the debate arose on how to combat the large - and rapidly expanding - debt crisis that put a significant hole in government finances. Delserre advocated for and ultimately pushed ahead with steep 20% cuts to government revenue, mainly in the departments of social security such as unemployment benefits. The Liberal ministry adopted the ideology that international trade would bring in the profits necessary to heal the economy and give the government the excess funds necessary to fund new industry to fully recover from the recession - it was believed that the floating bonds that had not been bought up would naturally be bought up again as the economic situation improved. 
This approach appeared initially fruitful - the rate of GDP decline stopped increasing during the fourth quarter of 1947 and the growth rate increased 2 percentage points to -2.4% in the first quarter of 1948. The inflation rate rapidly declined, falling from its peak of 49% to 8% in the first six months of 1948, extremely close to pre-recession levels. The winds of fortune changed, however, when Soralae officially declared recession in the final weeks of 1947, leading to protectionist measures such as decreased imports & exports, as well as raising tariffs on goods coming in. As Hōu Zhanaland's primary trading partner, this caused national exports to plummet, and the situation began to spiral after other nations began levying tariffs against Soralae & her Crown Realms, including Hōu Zhanaland, in response. In the second financial quarter of 1948, the recession began to rapidly pick up speed again, with the GDP growth rate falling to an all-time low of nearly 6.5% and unemployment nearly doubling in the span of around three months. Despite the estimates that inflation rates would fall into the negatives within the next few weeks, leading to a deflationary crisis that would only worsen the recession, the Liberals did not restart the flow of currency into the economy, the Exchange remained closed until the end of autumn. 
===Modern history===
By the end of summer, when the 1948 election took place, the recession had undoubtedly gotten worse. Both the Liberals & Labour suffered major defeats, with Labour losing 20 percentage points in national candidacy compared to 1940, and the Liberals failing to get re-elected for a term in their own right. The Nationals, who had never gotten more than 25% of the popular vote prior to this, won the election with over 41% of the vote, yet failed to achieve a seat majority or a plurality in national candidacy. They formed a second coalition with the Liberal Party, but under the condition that José Delserre would once again be the Prime Minister. After this, Sajo Inkoha of the Nationalists use this coalition to justify taking the seat of the Prime Minister, gaining recognition from the Labour Party but instantly ending the Liberal coalition. The Labour recognition still allowed him to become Prime Minister, and the Liberals did not contest it.
==Government & Politics==
Further information: Politics of Hōu Zhanaland
The Dominion of Hōu Zhanaland is classed as a responsible government dominionship of the Akashiro Shogunate, which is administered by a unitary parliamentary democracy. The government is elected one every eight years through a general election to serve in Parliament, officially known as the Huipūti, the unicameral legislature of Hōu Zhanaland. Parliament members are normally elected from members of the country's political parties running in each of the five constituencies and two territories. The party which gets the most seats has their party leader become the Prime Minister of Hōu Zhanaland. The Huipūti makes up the legislative branch of government, with the executive branch in the hands of the Prime Minister. The judicial branch is organised separately of the party system, with justices being elected by the Prime Minister incumbent to serve for life as unbiased members of the Supreme Court.
===Democratic system===
The democratic system in Hōu Zhanaland is a multi-party democracy, with three main parties participating in the electoral system. These three parties' candidates are elected to serve as Kainhos (members of Parliament) in the Huipūti, the national legislature, through a mixed-member proportional representation (MMP); citizens vote on their local representative (first-round) and then which party they wish to be in power at a national level (second-round). If a local candidate wins the majority of the vote in their constituency from the first-round vote, they become the Kainho for that constituency, and serve as one of the seven members of the nation's unicameral legislature. Whoever wins a majority of the second-round vote, regardless of how many seats they may have won in the first-round, forms the government, with the party leader becoming Prime Minister. There is no limit on how many terms one can serve in the Huipūti.
Elections are called after the Governor-General dismisses the Huipūti on the behalf of the Shogun, suspending all activities in government for a four-day period which the election takes place in. The party that wins the national vote meets with the Governor-General after the election to form the new government, after which the Huipūti is recalled and the new government begins session until the end of its term.
==== Prime Minister====
The Prime Minister is the head of government, and serves as the head of the legislative & executive branches of government. In order to run as Prime Minister, the party leader must be a member of the Huipūti at the time the election is called, and must have been serving in the Huipūti since before the previous election, giving an effective one-term limit on all politicians in the Huipūti before they are allowed to run for Prime Minister; in the same vein, only members of the Huipūti can run for the office. One person can only hold the role of Prime Minister for two terms (which do not have to be consecutive) before they can no longer run for the office. The Prime Minister must represent the interests of both the government and the people, and act in a non-partisan manner towards any social class. It is the Prime Minister's duty to preserve the democratic systems of the country, and any violations of the democratic systems will lead to impeachment, as outlined in the constitution. It is often tradition for the Prime Minister to host a National Address to the public detailing the actions of the government and the nation's stance on world affairs two to three times per eight-year term, as well as to travel to Tennyoku at least once per term to be a recipient of the Shogun.
List of Prime Ministers of Hōu Zhanaland
No.	Portrait	Name	Tenure 	Party 	Notes
1. 	 	Tigoma Seizō
(1857-1936)	1908-1910 (79-81 AU) (29-31 VE; 3 years) 	Independent 	Served as acting Prime Minister during the Federation procedures, stood down ahead of 1910 elections.
2. 	 	Koma Deizu
(1878-)	1910-1918 (81-8 AU) (31-38 VE; 7 years) 	Labour Party 	Oversaw a population boom between 1914 & 1916, as well as the founding of Quagerotown (Now Kaitaone). Stood down ahead of the 1918 elections.
3. 	 	Tigiyuto Akashiro
(1860-)	1918-1932 (88-101 AU) (38-54 VE; 13 years) 	Labour Party 	Oversaw a revived Labour majority in the Huipūti, expansion of public relations & the dissolution of all remaining racial segregation laws by 1931.
4. 	 	José C. Delserre
(1897-)	1932-1940 (101-10 AU) (54-62 VE; 8 years) 	Liberal Party 	Oversaw the first non-Labour government in the democratic era of Hou Zhanaland, a Lib-Nat coalition under Liberal leadership. Passed nine major
amendments to the constitution guaranteeing protection of civil rights, including the Bill of Rights 1934.
5. 	 	Fumaro Hasha
(1884-1941)	1940-1941 (110-11 AU) (62-63 VE; 13 months)	Labour Party 	Took over Labour in Tigiyuto's stead in 1937 & led the party to a pyrrhic victory in 1940. Died from 2 strokes after a little over a year in office.
6. 	TBA 	Sajo Tahiwai
(1905-)	1941-1947 (111-17 AU) (63-69 VE; 5 years) 	Labour Party 	Succeeded Fumaro Hasha as interim leader of Labour, until winning in their own right in 1943. The first national leader to have Sikoto ancestry.
Oversaw the end of the nation's "Silver Age" and eventual decline into the Great Recession before terminating his government in October 1947.
7. 	 	José C. Delserre
(1897-)	1947-1948 (117-18 AU) (69-70 VE; 8 months) 	Liberal Party 	Delserre's second premiership; served on an interim basis under the what was described as the "acting Prime Minister*" for the purpose of recovery
from the Recession until the 1948 election. Implemented harsh deflationary policies that led to a worsened recession by the end of his tenure.
8. 	 	Sajo Inkoha
(1918-)	1948-1956 (118-26 AU) (70-78 VE; 8 years) 	National Party	TBA
*Officially, Hou Zhanaland does not have the title of acting Prime Minister, and each Prime Minister is treated as the same, even if they are serving in a transitionary basis.
===Relationship with the Akashiren mainland===
Officially, Hōu Zhanaland is an elevated colonial territory of Akashiro, with the Shogunate & Hōu Zhanaland remaining very closely tied. The Shogun of Akashiro serves as the head of state of Hōu Zhanaland, sending a Governor-General as his representative to be present in Hōu Zhanaland. The position of Governor-General serves no official role, and is purely ceremonial, serving as the physical stand-in for the Shogun. The Shogun has the right to dismiss a Governor-General and select a new candidate at any time, should he consider their service to not be adequate or be representing the interests of the mainland. The Governor-General is also not allowed to run for any political office while they are serving their position, are not allowed to be leaders of a political party and can only hold 'political affiliation' to a party, not being allowed to formally support any candidate or party during an election. Governor-Generals are often advised to stay bipartisan to prevent issues. Akashiren ministries and offices also extend many of their operations to Hōu Zhanaland, mainly the Colonial, Infrastructure & National Security Offices, which act in the place of independent branches of responsible government. Akashiren defence also extends to Hōu Zhanaland, maintaining military bases in their territory despite the existence of a Hōu Zhanaland Defence Force (ZDF).
==Geography==
Hōu Zhanaland is divided into coastal lowlands, the mountains of the Sundati Highlands, the mKweze Plateau and extensive forests along the coast. Comprising five relatively flat plateaus of basalt soil, the highlands account for 59% of the country's arable land and 83% of its total non-forested land. The soil in much of the southern part of the country is relatively low in nutrients as a result of intense cultivation. Several minor earthquakes have been recorded since 1860. The northern part of the country consists mostly of seasonal wastes and underground caverns carved by the Sudwent River's tributaries, which extend deep into and underneath the highlands. The highest point in Hōu Zhanaland is located at the top of the Mabusu Plateau, which can extend up to 643m above sea level, making one of the highest areas in southern Talasi.
===Climate ===
Due to differences in latitude and the marked variety in topographical relief, Hōu Zhanaland's climate tends to vary considerably for each region. During the winter or dry season, extending roughly from late autumn to early spring, the monsoon winds usually blow from the west along the Talasi south coast and across the Gulf of Waimarama, picking up considerable moisture. The average annual temperature is generally higher in the plains along the coastline than in the mountains, especially around Gaaten. Temperatures vary less in the Highlands, ranging from between -21 and -16°C (-6 to 3.2°F) over the year. In Gaaten and the surrounding areas of the Gulf of Waimarama, the temperatures are much higher between 15 and 33 °C (59 and 91 °F). Seasonal variations in the seasonal wastes in the northernmost areas are much more dramatic, with temperatures varying from 3 °C (37 °F) in the harsh winter months to 37 °C (99 °F) in the midst of summer. During winter, rain occasionally falls over the highest peaks of the far eastern plateaus near the Calaran border. The south receives high rates of precipitation in the form of rainfall with an average amount from 1,500 to 2,000 mm (60 to 80 in) during the monsoon seasons; this often causes flooding, especially in the cities with poor drainage systems. The country is also affected by the remains of tropical depressions, tropical storms and typhoons that migrate from western Talasi and across from Halinn.
===Administrative Divisions===
After the Acts of Federation in 1909, Hōu Zhanaland is divided into five provinces, with two territories surrounding the 'homelands' of the Sikoto & Binnebo people groups. Provinces are administrated by the Huipūti and represented by their local Kainhos, whilst the territories are administrated directly by the Prime Minister, despite also electing a Kainho each to the Huipūti.
===Demography===
The population of Hōu Zhanaland is 2,185,000 as of 1909. The vast majority of the population live in the two largest urban areas, being Haikato, which houses over 40% of the population, and Gaaten, housing less than 20% of the population. The rural regions in the Sudwentaland Territory are some of the most sparsely populated areas in the world, being largely covered in paddy fields & tundra wastes atop the plateaus. The urban/rural spread of the population is roughly 72%/28%, with the life expectancy in the urban areas being significantly higher than the rural regions; according to a study conducted in 1908, life expectancy in the urban regions was between 62 & 64, whilst the rural areas can have life expectancies as low as 31. The dominant Sikoto ethnic group, which makes up over 80% of the population, have very little representation in government, despite the compromises that technically ended minority rule in 1904.
==Vexillology==
Hōu Zhanaland has a complex vexillological system that it uses to represent itself to the world at large, mainly concerning what is known as "flag policy". These determine what kind of flags can be flown where, and distinctly defines the usage of multiple flags in different calibres of state representation.
Type 	Symbol	Notes
National flag & Civil ensign 	 	The national flag of Hōu Zhanaland is the official flag of the state and is additionally titled the state's civil ensign. The flag is officially the civil flag of the nation, being allowed to be flown by anyone, and is most often flown by civilians on nongovernmental installations or craft. The flag is also used by civilian vessels to denote their nationality. The flag was designed during the Colonial Conferences in Tennyoku in the mid-1910s, taking inspiration from both the previous flag of Hōu Zhanaland as its centrepiece & the royal pattern of the historic Ma-tuso dynasty, which united the Sikoto prior to colonisation. The royal pattern is interwoven with the colours of the Sikoto & the Sundati peoples - the full flag was designed as an art piece to represent the unity of indigenous and settler peoples.
Government ensign 	 	The government ensign, better known as the Colonial Ensign, is the flag flown on buildings and other properties of the Government of Hōu Zhanaland. These include government buildings such as Parliament House, the Office of the Governor-General and the Prime Minister's residence. The flag is also flown at historic sites that were constructed during the colonial era of Hōu Zhanaland, as the flag is an exact replica of the colonial ensign used by the Colony of Hōu Zhanaland between 1886 and 1908.
State flags and historic ensigns	 	State flags, such as the flag of the State of Sundatano (shown here) are used for representation on official state buildings. Flags which were used by previous colonial administrations, such as the flag of the Colony of Sundatano, are still used at historic sites across much of the country, as they were former colonial territories. Sites such as the Resolute Flagpole still fly the historic ensign despite the flagpole's position next to one of the country's major harbours, due to the flagpole's designation as a historic site.
Territory flags 	 	Flags of government territories, such as the Sudwentaland Territory (shown here) are used only for government offices within the territory. More often than not, government territories will fly the government ensign outside important buildings alongside the territory flag to indicate that they are directly administered by the national government. Some of these flags, especially if they represent a people group such as the Sikoto, are occasionally used recreationally to represent the people group in government, although this is to a limited capacity.
Category:Hou Zhanaland
Category:Akashiro
Category:Sundatano
Category:Talasi