The Last Post

The piece of news that has done most to grab my attention this week is the controversy over Horz Kreepiman's plans to part-privatise Albia's much-maligned postal service, the ARZ. The reshaping of an institution that can trace its origins back some 350 years and more is no small matter but, more than that, the fate of the organisation that delivers the mail will always be of enormous concern to someone who has been awaiting the cheque(1) from his employer for over a fortnight.

The move has caused consternation not just among impoverished journalists who have lost that nice little bit of moonlighting work they had going(3), but also among Krep Party BGs and union members. Indeed, the latter group has been so outraged that last Tuesday saw a significant demonstration by postal workers, who showed the extent of their outrage both by turning up before 8pm and by not bunging all their placards in a heap behind the bins on the edge of the estate before bunking off early for 17 or 18 potato-based-alcohols down the pub.

Krep party BGs, meanwhile, fear the plans presage the full privatisation of the ARZ. This would, of course, be directly contrary to the "pledge" made in the party's general election manifesto - thus making it almost a cast iron certainty to occur. Many now predict both a sizable rebellion in the Krep Party and that the government will be forced to rely on the support of the Nyesti opposition ... given the perfidious nature of politics in Albia, however, I for one would be reluctant to wager too much on the Nyestis obliging.

(1) My younger readers should be aware that a cheque is a form of payment(2), a written order to a bank to pay a named sum from the drawer's account to the bearer or the person named upon the face of the cheque.
(2) Payment being something grown-ups had to do back before you could pirate everything for free on the intertube.
(3) See note (2) to Rights Issues.