Politics in Kimmystan

The King of Kimmystan

Kimmystan is a sovereign state where the head of state is King Kim A. F. Karlsen, also just known as King Kim of Kimmystan.

Although Kimmystan's King has ruled for several years, they have a parliamentary government called Storatingur. The Storatingur meets monthly at the castle in Nordfjord where they discuss different political issues or just gossip.

The prime minister is the the head of the government of Kimmystan, and is decided by elections that is held every 4th year in the fall. The party with the highest percentage of votes will select a person to take the role as the prime minister (usually the leader of the party). The King can also select the prime minister personally if he does not agree with the party's choice.

Political System

Storatingur is the supreme legislature of Kimmystan, established in 1780 by the Constitution of Kimmystan. It is located in Nordfjord. The unicameral parliament has 169 members, and is elected every four years based on party-list proportional representation in six plural member constituencies. (the six regions of Kimmystan). All of the inhabitants that are 16 or older have the right to vote in the elections being held in Kimmystan.

The assembly is led by a president and 2 vice presidents— and is called the presidium. The members are allocated to twelve standing committees. Following the 2015 election, seven parties are represented in parliament: Conservative Kimmystan (69 reprenstatives), the Progress Party of Kimmystan (40), the Pirate Party (20), the Non Religious People Party (20), the Middle Party (7), the Rebel Party (7), and the Green Party (6).

The prime minister is usually the leader of the party that receive the most votes in the election. Different parties can go together and form an alliance in order to achieve a majority government. A majority government is a government formed by a governing party that has an absolute majority of seats in the legislature or parliament in a parliamentary system. A majority government is usually assured of having its legislation passed and rarely, if ever, has to fear being defeated in parliament, unless the president strongly disagree with the government. The current government of Kimmystan consists of the Conservative Kimmystan and the Progress Party of Kimmystan, while the party that are supporting the government are the Pirate Party. The opposition consists of the Non Religious Party, the Middle Party, the Rebel Party and the Green Party.

Procedure

The legislative procedure goes through five stages. First, a bill is introduced to parliament either by a member of government or, in the case of a private member's bill, by any individual representative. Parliament will refer the bill to the relevant standing committee, where it will be subjected to detailed consideration in the committee stage. The first reading takes place when parliament debates the recommendation from the committee, and then takes a vote. If the bill is dismissed, the procedure ends. The second reading takes place at least three days after the first reading, in which parliament debates the bill again. A new vote is taken, and if successful, the bill is submitted to the President to approval. If parliament comes to a different conclusion during the second reading, a third reading will be held at least three days later, repeating the debate and vote, and may adopt the amendments from the second reading or finally dismiss the bill.

Once the bill has reached the Kimmystan the bill must be signed by the King himself and countersigned by the Prime Minister. It then becomes a Kimmystanian law from the date stated in the act or decided by the government.

Elections

Members to Storatingur are elected based on party-list proportional representation in plural member constituencies. This means that representatives from different political parties are elected from each constituency. The constituencies are identical to the 6 regions of Kimmystan. The electorate does not vote for individuals but rather for party lists, with a ranked list of candidates nominated by the party. This means that the person on top of the list will get the seat unless the voter alters the ballot.

The Sainte-Laguë method is used for allocating parliamentary seats to parties. As a result, the percentage of representatives is roughly equal to the nationwide percentage of votes.

The number of members to be returned from each constituency varies between 4 and 19. To determine the apportionment of the 169 seats amongst the 6 regions, a two-tier formula is used, based on population and geographic size. Each inhabitant counts one point, while each square kilometer counts 1.8 points

157 of the seats are regular district seats. These are awarded based on the election results in each county, and are unaffected by results in other counties. Twelve of the seats (two for each region) are leveling seats which are given to parties that win fewer seats than their share of the national popular vote entitles them to. A party must win 4% of the popular vote in order to win compensation seats, but may still win district seats even if it fails to reach this threshold. The system for apportioning seats is biased in favour of rural areas since the area of the county is a factor, but the system of compensation seats reduces the effect this has on final party strength.