Klaolack

The Free State of Klaolack is one of the rare free countries of Primordia that lies at the extreme south-west of Desheret. Until recently the free state was known as Port-Saint-Charles one of the jewel colonies of the Perigueux Directorate, one of the founding members of the League. However as Perigueux was lost to the fires of war with foreign armies and uprisings plunging the country into chaos, Port-Saint-Charles found itself functionally independent.

At first the few colonial officials left there to supervise the extraction and shipment of resources and men to the homeland tried to maintain some semblance of imperial order, but the majority native colonial army rebelled against them at the first occasion. While normally such a rebellion could not have succeeded without one of the many great powers stepping in to reassert control, at this point in the war most were already exhausted fighting each other and had little time and resources dedicated to such projects.

So the Free State of Klaolack was declared, founded by native officers of the ex-colonial army with the backing of traditional chiefs. These new elites quickly grew rich as they took over the country's vast export oriented economy, based on the production of peanuts and beef. Now free to sell their produce on the international market ships from all of the great powers would sail to Klaolack as the demands of the war and the increasing degradation of soil and production capacities forced them to look abroad to feed their people.

Although the capital of Sare Sosse is now home to an increasingly rich and worldly elite, not much has changed for the average citizen. Most still toil on the peanuts plantations and the pastoralists of the interior and their great bovine herds live no differently than they have for centuries. The central government has attempted some programs to foster patriotism and a sense of nationhood, but so far lucrative contracts with Imperial Grain Co or Flaglander Muhlekombinat AG have proven more attractive than social programs.

Some things are stirring on the plantations however and the industrial river port of Keur Massar is stirring with revolutionary sentiment. Klaolack Labourism is a relatively recent development but is spreading like wildfire amongst the workers under the leadership of Gom Bambey and the illegal All-Klaolack Peasant Federation. Bambey is the author of many inflammatory tracts declaring that the nation can only truly become free once it achieves economic as well as financial independence from the great powers. Additionally the movement also harbours a few truly ambitious revolutionaries such as Kedieo Boungoye who envision Klaolack as a revolutionary vanguard whose historical mission is to free all of Primordia from imperialist oppression under the banners of Klaolack Labourism. Due to increasing pressure from the Imperial intelligence service the Free State considers these firebrands as public enemies of the first degree and high bounties have been put up for their heads.

One of the few successful programs of the new government has been the successful creation of a domestic film industry. As most of the population is still illiterate and efforts to remedy this are going slowly, mostly because the state still hasn't decided on what language to standardise on, movies were found to be an ingenious way to bridge the gap and foster a national culture amongst the lower classes in the great industrial ports. This approach has garnered some success and with some funding from Wikhullan investors, a small film industry has taken form.

Most Klaolack productions are simple situational or romantic comedies usually 20 to 40 minutes in length with a patriotic undertone created for the domestic market. There have been however a few more involved productions funded by Wikhullans usually with international release in mind. Due to the incredibly cheap workforce and exotic setting Klaolack pictures have proven decently popular in Torskland and other war weary northern states longing for light entertainment taking their minds away from the war. The breakout star of this generation is undoubtedly Maryam N'Diaye, known for her roles in romantic dramas that has made her a household name both at home and abroad.