Saber

Saber is the current Prime Minister, Liberal leader and a member of the National Assembly of Doggerland. He held numerous shadow ministerial posts and formerly served as the Minister of Justice. He previously served as the Mayor of Leestrom between 2008 to 2020.

Early life
Saber was born in 1964 in Port Nandels, Brun-Nord to a Korean-English agnostic liberal family. His ancestry dates back to protestant Spanish immigrants in 1500 hence his surname, however, he is only referred to by his first name Saber. He also has part Dutch ancestry. His Korean heritage begins in 1901 when in order to flee Japanese colonialism in Korea his ancestors fled across Asia to Europe and eventually settled in Doggerland.

His family had a strong tradition of working in agriculture with his father briefly working in agriculture in the family cabbage farm. However, his father moved to Port Nandels in the 1930s to become an author, it was there his father met his mother who was working in the civil service. This led to Saber frequently visiting the family farm and gained moderate knowledge of agricultural affairs.

Saber showed early proficiency in debate and politics. He graduated high school in 1982 and attended the University of Leeds obtaining an undergraduate in law graduating in 1985.

Early career
Saber first worked as a prosecutor for 7 years until 1992 when he later chose to become a human rights lawyer. During this time he worked across not just Doggerland but Europe to help fight for social justice and defend those who couldn't afford counsel. In 2001, he once again retired from his profession to pursue a career in politics by first working in various councils and government institutions. He also frequently joined in protests for workers' rights and rallies to fight against legal injustices.

In 2002, he worked primarily in Leestrom. He was invited in 2004 by the central government to help run a panel for legal reforms across the country. He first decided not to join any political party but was closely affiliated with the Liberal Party due to his personal ideologies. His first experience in being elected was when he became a member of the Leestrom city council in 2006 during a by-election, however, he was still an independent although he would caucus with the Liberal Party.

Mayor of Leestrom
Saber retired from his seat in 2008 to run for mayor of Leestrom and won by 51% in a hard fought campaign against his left-wing opponent with political experts crediting his status as a human rights lawyer being key in his victory. His tenure as mayor was marked with initial popularity as he improved and increased access to public transport and made the welfare programme more comprehensive for the elderly and youth. Another signature policy was the construction of public housing to curb rising real estate prices. This project was credited with avoiding a potential real estate crisis averting unaffordable prices. Leestrom's debt was also eliminated.

One of his greatest projects in his first term was the "Leestrom City Sharing Project" which involved the expanding of Leestrom's infrastructure and technological knowledge to develop other areas. This involved helping invest in agricultural technology in surrounding farms to boost the inflow of agricultural products into Leestrom. Saber subsequently developed close relations with other agrarian groups in the region. He also helped in the creation of agricultural cooperatives across Zuibete.

In 2012 he ran again and won with an increased majority of 55%, however, the Liberals in the city council lost their majority which marked decreased cooperation and productivity. He still remained popular implementing a youth dividend where budget surpluses would be used as dividends for students aged 18 to 22 between 2012-2014. Leestrom Cultural District was also established in 2015 creating a shopping street, department stores, coffeehouses, and restaurants. The district was designated a no-smoking zone in early 2016, and remains a consistently high source of revenue for the city and a tourist attraction for the country's people. His second term also saw him working closely with local trade unions, working together to draft workplace safety guidelines and negotiating regulations on both businesses and unions.

In 2016, he was reelected with 56% for his last term with the Liberal Party regaining the majority in the city. His last term saw him establishing Leestrom City Hospital and reducing the rate of poverty. His final policies involved funding projects to make the buses in Leestrom fully electric or hybrid. Congestion pricing was also introduced after public transport in the city was given a A- rating. He garnered controversy when he frequently ignored the needs of both left-wing and right-wing protesters never uttering a mention of having attention towards their issues.

By the time he left he had an approval rating of 61%, while his highest was 65% and lowest being 43%.

Joining the Liberal Party
In 2021, Saber joined the Liberal Party after realising his position as a centre to centre-left liberal and permanently moved to Leestrom. He helped draft the social and justice mandates for the Liberal Party manifesto earning a 4th place spot on the party list for the 2021 January election. Saber was subsequently appointed the Shadow Chancellor of the Treasury.

February election
After again drafting the social and justice policy, and newly the Home policy, Saber was once again placed 4th on the list and reelected.

2021 February Senate election
On 23 February, Saber announced his official candidacy for the 8th Senate district, subsequently announcing his change to becoming a candidate in the 5th district. He later moved to Abester. He lost the election by one vote to Robert La Follette.

2021 March Liberal Party Deputy Leadership election
After Triangle's death and InsertUsernameHere's resignation, Saber ran for deputy leader handily winning.

Leader of the Liberal Party
Saber assumed the leadership of the Liberal Party after InsertUsernameHere resigned, and subsequently became the official leader after winning with 7 votes against Baveland.

In April 2021, Saber announced his tour across select countries in Europe and Asia to expand his knowledge of foreign policy as his new position as shadow foreign minister. This meant that although he will remain the official leader, Baveland would become the interim leader on any occasion of Saber's absence. In reality the tour was a lore reasoning when in real life Saber had IB exams so he would be more busy than usual.

Minister of Justice
After the April 2021 elections Saber was appointed the Minister of Justice after entering a broad coalition. He was tasked with bringing forth charges to Beady for his electoral misconduct.

Representative of Leestrom 1st
After the 14 May 2021 election was declared to be used under MMP, Saber stood for the Leestrom 1st constituency. He was elected with a landslide of 58.51% of the vote due to his popularity in the city.

Becoming Prime Minister
After lengthy negotiations Saber was appointed Prime Minister with an investiture of 67 to 65.

Political views
Saber identifies as socially progressive and pragmatic in economic affairs while maintaining a largely liberal ideology. He supports LGBTQIA+ rights, women's rights, minority rights, and social progressivism. Saber is a supporter of centrism and rejects far-left and far-right approaches to politics. He mostly identifies as centre or centre-left, slightly left on most issues, but maintains a broad centrist appraoch. Saber is also a secular humanist.

In his campaign for Senate, he described his ideology as "liberalism inspired by social democracy" alluding to his past as being socialist. He personally considers himself to be on the more centrist wing of the party leaning left.

Previous views
Originally while growing up and learning about other ideologies, Saber had dabbled in various beliefs. Once a strong left-wing nationalist, and briefly a communist, Saber gradually transformed his views after engaging with other centrist and right-leaning ideologies. He still harbours strong social-democratic sentiments which is the strongest cause of him tending to lean left on most issues. Saber used to be quite socially conservative and can still be so in certain areas involving crime, but has now fully transitioned to being a progressive liberal.

Personal influences
Saber looks up to figures such as Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore, Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun of South Korea, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Dwight D. Eisenhower of the US, and Tsai Ing-wen of Taiwan. He personally holds Lee Kuan Yew's influences close to his heart which made him accept that ruthless pragmatism is necessary in government on many occasions, albeit he does disagree with many of Lee's views. He also feels he has a lot to learn from other political individuals like Angela Merkel and Tony Blair, however, he doesn't look up to all of them and often simply holds simple respect or acknowledgement for their skills in politics.

Social policy
Saber is extremely socially progressive supportive of the rights of all, except religious rights due to his personal opposition to it. Strongly opposed to social conservatism he also has a strong dislike of conservatives in the US, South Korea, and Japan seeing them as "fossils". He also supports the decriminalisation of soft drugs and the sale of such drugs, with his own philosophy being "if cigarettes and alcohol can be legal why not marijuana?"

Originally on the fence regarding LGBTQIA+ rights, after learning further and engaging with members of the community his views have completely changed and remains a strong supporter of the community. Saber is also strongly pro-choice believing it is more unethical to force a woman to keep her fetus.

Saber moderately opposes communitarianism believing that if an individual does well then society as a whole does well but does believe certain checks do have to be maintained.

Economic policy
Saber is supportive of unions and the partial democratisation of the economy, however, opposes an entire transfer. A fervent believer in a social market economy akin to that of Germany and the UK. Saber is strongly opposed to both radical right-wing and left-wing policies, favouring moderate and pragmatic practices. His approach can be seen as regulating corporations while liberalising the local economy and preventing corruption to ensure fair practices. He has affection for Taiwan's model where there are a few conglomerates alongside a strong economy from small and medium-sized businesses.

In terms of wealth and taxation Saber believes that it is important to make sure that every corporation pays its workers accordingly, that they don't abuse workers, and eliminating corruption. However, he also believes that it is wrong for a government to take too much of one's wealth whether extremely rich or poor preferring at best a top tax rate of 60% for income taxes and believes that at least for small and medium-sized businesses taxation should be low. As aforementioned he is also supportive of unions deeming them a necessary balance against businesses but thinks that unions gaining too much power against large businesses wouldn't be in the economy's best interest, thinking the same for the reverse.

He is also in favour of implementing policy to ensures wage ratios (e.g. so if a company has higher profit then everyone regardless of whether they're CEOs or janitors receive a higher wage. Albeit he hasn't presented any legislation to implement this as of yet.

Saber supports expansionary fiscal policy and long-term supply-side policies to increase economic growth and production.

Foreign policy and immigration
Saber is a soft Eurosceptic and believes the EU should remain in its current state not expanding its powers, but is in favour of joining the union.

Saber also supports a points-based system for skilled immigrants while only providing visas for manual workers with a potential path to citizenship. It is his opinion that a country can only go so far in handling and receiving immigrants. Despite this, he leans substantially towards multiculturalism tolerating other cultures as long as it is within the realm of respecting Doggerland's laws and personally believes that while it is essential to maintain a strong sense of one's original culture it is just as important to broadly assimilate into society.

Monarchy
Saber is neither supportive nor opposed to the monarchy, remaining ambivalent.

Religion
Saber is an atheist but does his best to maintain respect for other religions, however, he maintains a strong hatred for Islam and radical Christianity. He has a strong hatred for the two due to their lack of social tolerance and what he deems a "roadblock" to government affairs. While an anti-communist, Saber feels the one good thing about Marx was his rejection of religion. He is likewise a strong secularist and opposes religious influence in government. Despite this he does get along with those who are religious, with his own clarification being that he opposes the faith not necessarily the faithful.

This dislike of faith was born from his experience of reading about religious violence and seeing its impacts in history and the modern day. After he read about the crusades and saw the radical evangelicals of the present opposing LGBT rights he became passionate in opposing religious radicalisation. Similarly with Islam he saw how women are stoned to death for being raped, how spousal rape is tolerated, and how people are killed just for being gay. He is also critical of Islamic States condemning Emmanuel Macron for permitting the Charlie Hebdo drawings believing that it isn't France and other European countries' responsibility to make them more comfortable for Muslims.

Saber does oppose the ban on the hijab believing that wearing what one wishes to wear is a personal choice. Albeit he personally finds it farcical that women in western countries fight to wear the hijab while women in middle eastern countries have to wear it under the threat of force.

Neoliberalism
Saber is opposed to neoliberalism believing that it undoes too much of social security and welfare and considers a humane approach to an economy extremely important viewing over-deregulation as an inefficient way of economic management, while he also believes over-regulation to likewise be inefficient. Complementing his views he opposes austerity in most cases believing that simply cutting a budget isn't the right solution and that it causes more harm than good. He also thinks that the philosophy that a free market solves everything is a fantasy.

Socialist Reform Bill
Saber has shown staunch opposition to the Socialist Reform Bill, believing its economic and societal impacts will be extremely negative for Doggerland. Despite this, he has moderated his stance and has come to accept certain parts of the bill advocating for modification instead of abolishing it.

Personal life
Saber is married with 2 sons. He is an only child. He met his wife in 1990 when he was still working as a prosecutor and later married her in 1991. His wife still works as a civil servant. His eldest son runs a cafe in Nandels Port, while his youngest son works as a federal police officer.

Saber frequently visits his mother in Port Nandels, but struggled to do so during the COVID-19 Pandemic. His father had passed in 2012, to this day Saber keeps his father's influence on him close to his heart.

Saber owns three houses, one in Leestrom, Nandels Port, and Abester, currently residing in Leestrom after moving back. After he became Prime Minister, Saber moved to Nandels Port.

Saber speaks British English and Korean. He is in the process of learning Dutch, however, he struggles only being able to speak in Google Translate.