Friday, November 13, 2009
King of Tonga surrenders power
In yet another triumph for "Democracy" and defeat for tradition, King George Tupou V of Tonga has agreed to relinquish his executive powers in favour of the development of a Western-style parliamentary constitutional monarchy in which politicians will presumably be the real rulers. While unlike the most hardline sort of reactionary monarchists I prefer a "figurehead" monarchy to none at all, I am sorry to see yet another king reduced to a powerless symbol. Note the article's arrogant tone of inevitability. Nothing in politics is truly inevitable, yet the great triumph of the forces of "Progress" has been to convince many people that their agenda is.
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Ugh! Hardly 'progress' in my book either. I must say though it hurts less than similar past events in my former little Shangri-La of Bhutan where the people had to be dragged kicking and screaming into democracy. There was at least some political pressure for it to happen in this case. Still stinks though.
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