We are officially a republic, and also attempting to become a democracy. Right now it’s just two people in Mangoville, Mysterious Admin and myself. We believe that numbers are not important and that we should adopt the best practices from the word go. Therefore we decided to hold elections. I was the sole nominee and the sole vote of Mysterious Admin fell in my pocket, which has legally made me the President. We have not yet written a constitution and although it is important, experience tells us that we can manage without it for some time. I mean, the two of us can simply part ways if we don’t like each other, no?
As President, one my my first projects is to build good relations with the real people around us. Hence I am also declaring myself the External Affairs Minister, because Mysterious Admin has refused to accept any responsibility other than being admin, which frankly at this stage is barely any work. Actually I will come straight to the point. I am going to assume charge of all ministries for the foreseeable future.
Inflation
Inflation is the top agenda in Mangoville. Covid has receded but its after effects have not. More importantly, it has become convenient to blame all problems in the economy to Covid, and lately to the Ukraine war. Deeply interconnected world and all that stuff. It seems that as the world is getting more and more connected, governance is getting more and more disconnected from the people. Even educated people are telling me that it is worse in other countries. That I should not be getting upset all the time. They even asked me to change my profile picture. I have no intention of doing so. It is the only thing under my control at the moment.
Mangoes haven’t arrived in the market as yet, so I don’t know how badly inflation is going to affect me. Our grocery bills are already 20% higher and petrol is 10% higher in a week. These will never come down and yet at the end of the year some economist will tell us that inflation was 5.5%. They say that they calculate inflation based on a ‘basket of goods’, which includes boring things like cement and steel. Supposedly these boring things that we don’t consume on day to day basis keep inflation in check. Thank you cement and steel. Out of gratitude I have decided to erect a statue of Cement God in my house. It generated some employment also, so there is a ‘feel good factor’ about it. Although the statue does not feel very good to touch.