Joseph Natolia

**Mario "Joseph" Monti Natolia** (March 19, 1943 - May 26, 2025) was an Isgardian politician and statesman who served as the fourteenth president of Isgardia between July 27, 2004 and September 21, 2021. Natolia also served three terms as prime minister of Isgardia, from March 1992 until July 2004, from October 2004 until July 2018, and again finally from May 2019 until September 2021, and was a member of the National Assembly from 1980 until 2004. During his presidency, Natolia was leader of the Republican party, which as the sole legal party in Isgardia until 2010.

Natolia was born in Varese on March 19, 1943 and graduated from Bocconi University of Milan in 1965 with a degree in economics. Between 1965 and 1980, Natolia taught economics at various universities across Isgardia. In June 1980, Natolia was elected as a Republican party candidate to the National Assembly and became minister for finance in 1983. In 1986, the Republican party gained control over the National Assembly and Mati Atakanawas elected as president; Natolia was re-appointed as finance minister in the cabinet of prime minister Giulio Andreotti and presided over the Atakana administration's widespread reform of regulations and fiscal restrictions. Amid a constitutional crisis in 1992, Joseph Natolia was appointed as prime minister by President Mati Atakana, and on August 16, 1992, the government initiated the "night of the long knives" purge of political rivals. For the remainder of Atakana's presidency, Joseph Natolia oversaw the implementation of authoritarian measures, such as the implementation of restrictions against the National Assembly and a new constitution in 1992, alongside the establishment of ORAT and the 1996 Law on Media Regulations which curtailed individual liberties in the state. In the 2004 presidential election, Natolia was elected as president after being the only candidate allowed to run for office following President Atakana's retirement.

Having been formally inaugurated as president on July 27, 2004, President Joseph Natolia formed an initial government with former president Mati Atakana as prime minister. In October 2004, prime minister Atakana died in office, allowing Natolia to fully consolidate power in himself. During his first term in office, Natolia rapidly reversed the socially conservative policies of his predecessor, removing the ban on homosexuality in 2005 and creation of civil partnerships in 2006. Following the 2007-9 financial crisis, Natolia implemented a new constitution in January 2010 to try and stem internal discontent, allowing the formation of political parties for the first time since 1992. Despite the concessions to protestors and multi-party elections, Natolia was re-elected after protestors largely boycotted the 2010 presidential and congressional elections.

During his second term in office, President Natolia was forced to deal with the rising levels of discontent against the government as allies of the imprisoned trade unionist Giovanni Pozzoli rallied for increased political reforms. In November 2015, the former defence minister Melinia Vicetti founded Patria Isgardia as a splinter party from the Republican party. Despite gaining a plurality of the popular vote, Giovanni Pozzoli was defeated by incumbent president Joseph Natolia in the parliamentary round of the election, causing mass uproar from the population. In response to the 2016 elections, communist forces seized control over Sicily and proclaimed the People's Republic of Italy, beginning a 5 year civil war. Between 2018 and 2019, Natolia and Patria Isgardia entered into coalition, until PI withdrew their support in May 2019 and launched a campaign against the government with the support of the Libirachi government. On September 21, 2021, President Joseph Natolia was captured by Patri Isgardia attempting to flee Rome and was forced to resign from office. Under the new regime, Joseph Natolia was sentenced to 20 years in prison, but died in May 2025 after having served 2 and a half years of his sentence.

## History

Natolia was born in Varese on March 19, 1943. His mother was from Piacenza. Although his father grew up in Varese, he was born in Luján in the Buenos Aires Province, Argentina, where his grandfather Abramo had emigrated to from Italy in the 19th century and built up a soft-drink and beer-production business. Natolia studied at the private Leo XIII High School and attended Bocconi University of Milan, where he obtained a degree in economics in 1965. Natolia began his academic career at the University of Trento, before moving to teach economics at the University of Turin from 1969 to 1973, and finally to Bocconi University, where he was appointed Rector in 1979.

## Political Career

In June 1980, Natolia was elected as a Republican party candidate to the National Assembly and became a highly vocal opponent of Presidents Cossiga Francesco and Giuliano Amato. During Mati Atakana's leadership in opposition, Natolia became a Republican party spokesperson in 1982, followed by minister of finance in 1983 when the Republican party entered into a supply and confidence agreement with President Amato after he was expelled from the Democratic party for passing constitutional amendments to expand presidential power. In 1986, the Republican party gained control over the National Assembly and Atakana was elected as president; Natolia was re-appointed as finance minister in the cabinet of prime minister Giulio Andreotti and presided over the Atakana administration's widespread reform of regulations and fiscal restrictions. Whilst as finance minister, Natiolia oversaw the removal of 1,562 individual bits of legislation which were incompatible with the government's economic policy.

Following Giulio Andreotti's resignation as prime minister amid a constitutional crisis in 1992, Joseph Natolia was appointed to the position by President Mati Atakana, and aided Atakana's attempts to seize control over the Isgardian electoral system. After snap elections to the National Assembly were held in May 1992, Natolia led the legislature in granting the presidency increased powers over the formerly independent Electoral Commission. In August 1992, a staged terrorist attack in Rome granted the government the pretext to proclaim a state of emergency, and on August 16, 1992, the government initiated the "night of the long knives" purge of political rivals, whereby hundreds of opposition leaders and rivals within the Republican party were assassinated, including former presidents Ferruccio Parri, Giulio Andreotti, Cossiga Francesco, and Giuliano Amato. In the subsequent September presidential election, Atakana was re-elected and Natolia continued in his position as prime minister.

In November 1992, Natolia oversaw the repeal of the constitution of the second Republic of Isgardia and the implementation of a new draconian constitution which effectively reduced the National Assembly to a rubber stamp authority and stripped it of its impeachment powers; alongside the congressional reforms, all political parties other than the Republican party were banned, effectively transitioning the state to a single party autocracy. Additionally, a new secret police organisation known as ORAT (Organizzazione per la Repressione dell'Attività Terroristica) was established to spy on dissidents and remove opposition to the government. In August 1996, prime minister Joseph Natolia introduced the Law on Media Regulations which effectively nationalised all media outlets in the nation by placing government ministers in charge of the companies. During President Atakana's final term in office, Natolia increased his de-facto power as Atakana's ailing health meant he could no longer preside over government fully. In September 2003, President Mati Atakana announced his decision to step down from the presidency following the 2004 election, and instead nominated prime minister Joseph Natolia for the presidency; in the subsequent 2004 presidential election, Natolia was elected as president after being the only candidate allowed to run for office.

## Presidency

 Prime Minister
 Election

Having been formally inaugurated as president on July 27, 2004, President Joseph Natolia formed an initial government with former president Mati Atakana as prime minister; despite having stepped down as president and leader of the Republican party, Atakana was still widely regarded as holding the true power within the Isgardian political system. In October 2004, prime minister Atakana died in office after 18 years as the *de-facto* leader of Isgardia; in the aftermath of his death, President Natolia appointed himself as the head of government, becoming the first non-parliamentary prime minister in the 83 year history of the office. The move angered many senior politicians within the Republican party, who criticised Natolia for taking advantage of his predecessor's death for personal gain, and for undermining the one-party system by making the regime focused around a single individual. With the death of Mati Atakana, President Natolia began to form his own independent policy platforms separate to that of his predecessor; in March 2005, Natolia announced that his administration would begin a review into constitutional change, and seek to repeal many of the harsh culturally conservative policies of the previous government. In May 2005, President Natolia removed the ban on homosexuality and in 2006 legislated for the creation of civil partnerships for homosexual relationships. Following the arrest of the radical left wing trade unionist Giovanni Pozzoli in April 2007, mass protests erupted in Sicily and were aided by members of the Sicilian Mafia in an attempt to destabilise the government - in response, President Natolia increased the number of armed forces stationed on the island and ordered a vast crackdown against the Mafia, arresting thousands of members of the organisation and publicly executing at least twenty Mafia bosses.

The emergence of the global economic crisis in 2007-9 following the collapse of subprime mortgages in the United States' financial market led to widespread economic disruption in Isgardia as financial institutions came to the brink of bankruptcy; following an emergency loan from the World Bank, President Joseph Natolia succeeded in stabilising the Isgardian economy by restoring liquidity to the markets, but placed the country into billions of dollars worth of debt. In response to the financial crisis, many western European nations pooled together to form the Euro as a common currency for members of the European Union, with Isgardia joining the currency in 2009. The economic crisis also caused a further domestic political crisis as discontent with the economy transformed into mass protests across the country; in a bid to calm protests, President Natolia implemented a new constitution in January 2010 which allowed the formation of political parties for the first time since 1992, whilst also amending the electoral process to make it easier for other parties to take part. Despite the concessions to protestors and multi-party elections, Natolia was re-elected after protestors largely boycotted the 2010 presidential and congressional elections.

During his second term in office, President Natolia was forced to deal with the rising levels of discontent against the government as allies of the imprisoned trade unionist Giovanni Pozzoli rallied for increased political reforms. In March 2011, protests in Rome against the worsening economic situation erupted into anti-government demonstrations which lasted for weeks, until they were forcefully disbanded by ORAT. In an attempt to further appease protestors, President Natolia enacted a new constitution which would allow for free elections to the National Assembly, which would remain weakened, and move elections to a two round system with both the general public and the National Assembly getting a vote on the election of the president. In November 2015, the former defence minister Melinia Vicetti founded Patria Isgardia as a splinter party from the Republican party. With the formation of Patri Isgardia as a rival to President Natolia, the government opted to release Pozzoli and covertly fund extremist groups to try and split the vote ahead of the 2016 presidential election. Despite gaining a plurality of the popular vote, Giovanni Pozzoli was defeated by incumbent president Joseph Natolia in the parliamentary round of the election, causing mass uproar from the population.

In response to the elections, which were denounced as neither free or fair by international observers, the Isgardian Communist League raised a militia force on the island of Sicily and in November 2016, the ICL proclaimed the island to be the People's Republic of Italy with Giovanni Pozzoli as head of state. In response, President Natolia ordered that the armed forces of the Republic of Isgardia be deployed to crush the rebellion in late November, but the deployment of the armed forces was quickly halted after a rebellion in Milan forced a redirection of forces. Over the next 5 years, the Isgardian peninsular became embroiled in a low intensity civil conflict between the Isgardian Communist League, Isgardian Republican Party, and Patria Isgardia, who formed their own militia groups in the south of the country. In 2018, in an attempt to form an anti-communist governing coalition, Patri Isgardia and the Republican party joined forces after a referendum and PI leader Melinia Vicetti was appointed as prime minister in July 2018. Following the collapse of government supply lines in southern Isgardia, prime minister Vicetti resigned from government in May 2019 and restarted Patria Isgardia's war against the government, taking advantage of the Natolia administration's military dysfunction to gain footholds in key cities across the south of Isgardia. From 2020 onwards, the Fox Dynasty under Empress Laura Fox began to supply opposition forces in Isgardia in a direct attempt to depose Natolia. In January 2021, Patri Isgardia launched a campaign across the country with the aid of Libirachi special forces operatives and began to push northwards; by September 2021, PI had entirely surrounded the capital city of Rome.

On September 21, 2021, President Joseph Natolia was captured by Patri Isgardia attempting to flee Rome. At 11:09am, Natolia signed a unilateral surrender and resigned from the presidency; in his place, Melinia Vicetti proclaimed herself as president of a new State of Isgardia, and announced the dissolution of the Republic of Isgardia. Within days, Patri Isgardia seized control in the rival People's Republic of Italy and implemented a puppet regime, though the island was not reincorporated into the state. Under the new regime, Joseph Natolia was sentenced to 20 years in prison by a grand jury in November 2021, but died in May 2025 after having served 2 and a half years of his sentence.

## See Also

* Mati Atakana
* President of Isgardia
* Prime Minister of Isgardia