With elections for Prime Minister and the Council of Custodians fast approaching on December 1st, the current PM of Salad Land has thrown the race into chaos by abruptly switching parties.
Leighton Taylor, PM of Salad Land since 2020, was first elected as the leader of the Unlimited Salad Party. The USP has typically been a strong supporter of the status quo in Salad Land, and backers of the country’s mercurial leader Marquis Bastien de Salad. Taylor shocked the country today by announcing that he “can no longer in good conscience support a party that supports the Marquis”. Taylor said that he was inspired by the Republic Now movement in Zongongia to “seek a new direction for the Saladian people”. Taylor said that, after disagreements with the USP leadership, he was breaking away to form a new party. The new party, the Toss de Salad Party, has a mostly similar platform to that of the USP. There is, however, one big difference: Taylor’s new party is explicitly calling for the abolition of the Marquisate.
“Bastien de Salad isn’t fit to guide a dinghy, much less the Saladian ship of state. Saladians deserve better, and I am hoping that they will vote accordingly,” Taylor told the media. He outlined a list of accusations, claiming that the Marquis “is a grafter and confidence man” who routinely demands “gifts” (bribes) from Saladians and foreigners alike. Taylor also accused the Marquis of routinely misusing and spending government funds on himself.
Taylor also took exception with de Salad’s handling of Xiomera’s brief occupation of Salad Land in January 2024. To end the occupation, the Marquis agreed to release billions in Xiomeran assets that Taylor had ordered frozen as sanctions for Xiomera’s actions in Huenya. The Marquis also agreed to give Xiomera a small island, Wallington Island. The island was given to Xiomera in exchange for the forgiveness of 74 million quetzals worth of debt that Salad Land had racked up with two Xiomeran corporations. The debt was owed for the construction of a naval-themed tourist attraction based around an old Saladian warship, the SNS Neversink.
“The naval attraction was itself an idiotic scheme, but the Marquis compounded that by going into debt with some of the most predatory loan sharks out there, Xiomeran corporations. He then gave away sovereign Saladian land to pay off that debt. And now, Xiomera has a colony just off our shores, to menace us further,” Taylor said. “The entire debacle was a bungle of the highest order.”
Taylor said that he will immediately begin recruiting current members of the Council of Custodians to flip to his new party. He said that he will also actively work to unseat any Custodians who don’t switch parties. A little over a month remains before election day, and Taylor acknowledged that is very little time. But he said that Saladians are ready for change, and will jump at the chance to “toss de Salad” and abolish the position of Marquis.
Taylor’s old party, the USP, immediately named the head of the Council, Valère Patenaude, to replace him as their candidate for Prime Minister. Patenaude is a longtime USP member and a stanch Marquis loyalist. “Leighton forgets that the ‘bungle’ he is talking about was caused by him, not the Marquis or the Council. To grandstand on the world stage, he broke our long tradition of neutrality and open trade and froze the Xiomerans’ assets. That was the real reason Xiomera chose to occupy Salad Land, not anything else. Salad Land stands for free, open, unfettered trade and commerce. Leighton forgot that, and angered one of the world’s biggest economic and military powers in the process. That was the real bungle!” Patenaude also accused Taylor of launching his republican bid due to holding a grudge about the Marquis imprisoning him briefly during the conflict with Zargothrax in 2023.
Patenaude predicted that the USP would easily crush the “upstart” TdS Party. But Taylor is a popular leader, who was polling at an average of 72% among likely voters prior to his announcement. Taylor and his new party are clearly hoping that his personal popularity will translate to success.
Even if it does, it is unclear whether or not the Marquis de Salad would accept any electoral outcome that would result in the end of his position. So far, no one with the Palace has issued any kind of statement on the matter. The next month, however, should see an especially salty Salad Land.
