Meet Herbert Udvanger, the first NPC mayorMunicipal election in the town of Rodenkirken turned out well - a report by Kristjan LønnerHerbert Udvanger is a "local patriarch" to the farmers of the border area.The cold winter wind comes from Ostland and Hulstria, blowing discarded newspapers and food cases across the snowy main square. Everything is quiet this morning; a majority of the city's residents are attending Sunday service at church.
The border tripoint is only eight kilometers away from the town center of Rodenkirken, one of Kazulia's southernmost towns and the seat of one of Kelvon's fifteen counties. Hulstrian and Ostlandish nationalist groups have always meddled with the politics of the primarily agrarian, working-class region that was settled by Dundorfian colonists many centuries ago and eventually fell to the Kazulian crown. The royal families and the presidents have never interested the local populance, for whose the "Hutorian problem" has always been more important. Neonazi groups frequently attack the Showan minority that numbers 15 percent in the county, using weapons that are smuggled at night across the green border with Ostland.
"Skalm doesn't care about us, so we don't care about Skalm", says Jan Maier, a 78-year-old farmer whom we could win for a short conversation. "The only party which really cares about us is the NPC. All others treat us like useless scum."
We sit in a run-down cafe on the square and watch as a lonely worker arrives and begins to set up the first stalls for the weekly Sunday Afternoon Market. Two other men wearing technical overalls start gluing election posters to the walls of the colorful buildings, most of them promoting the far-right National Purity Congress.
"Frankenstein is rich. Yes, he is. But he is not a 'neo-feudalist'. This is what the left is saying. The left is in control of the media. The parties which call themselves 'conservative' are vassals of the left", says the old Kelvonian with a distinct Kiennese accent. The farmers of the region speak an archaic transistional dialect that stands between Kazulian and Hulstrian Dundorfian.
"Frankenstein is the only politician who visited us in the last twenty years. He promised us land reforms, and he will hold his promises. And Herbert Udvanger will hold his promises, too. I know him and he knows Frankenstein."
The General Chairman of the National Purity Congress had held a rally there in late December. Twenty thousand people from the area attended it, some even arrived from as far as Kien. Maier leads us up the church tower after we quietly pass through the crowd inside the neogothic building. The pastor, who is holding a sermon in the local dialect, gives him a friendly wink. The winter wind whips our faces with great intensity as we enter the open bell chamber. Maier points at a faint hill in the south, already in Hulstria. "Castle Frankenstein", he exclaims.
The fascist politician's ancestors, knights and vassals of the Hulstrian emperor, owned the estate until it was sold to an investor from Dorvik.
Town center of Rodenkirken, Kelvon. The town is famous for almost always voting conservative.Frankenstein's campaign has been very effective in the region thanks to Herbert Udvanger, who has become mayor of Rodenkirken and county administrator in the regional election last week. The landowner and enterpreneur, distantly related to Frankenstein himself, is considered to be one of the founding members of the NPC, which originated in the area. The 65-year old former teacher and professor is noted for advocating unification between Hulstria, Kazulia and Ostland and deportation of Gao-Showans. He will become the governor of the Fylke if Frankenstein attains a majority in the nearing election.
We arrive at Udvanger's new office in the city hall. He puts the crate which he is unpacking down and greets us heartily. His secretary brings us tea and chocolate cake. Our first question pertains to the nature of the promised "land reforms", which Frankenstein, who is a major landowner, is propagnating.
"We will drive out foreign landlords and give the land back to the Kazulian and Hulstrian people living here", proclaims the mayor. He is the first NPC member to win a local election in the kingdom - at 77.5%. "The Grünberg maffia is in control of two farms that directly border the city. They have stolen them from the peasants who originally lived there."
Yes - Udvanger (whose brother, Kurt Udvanger, is the director of the local grammar school) believes in conspiracy theories that claim the total control of Kazulian economy by a handful of Yeudic families.
Socialists warn that Frankenstein, who already owns two factories (and is the largest employer) in the unemployment-stricken county, will not redistribute the land amongst the poor but rather give it to his confederates, all billionaires hungry for more wealth.
"Total nonsense. Everybody who says that has been paid to sabotage our campaign by the centrist parties, who are afraid of power loss and understand the strength of the NPC", answers the local patriarch who has known Frankenstein since he worked as the director of a FlexiCorp site.
We ask about Udvanger's stance on the indigenous Showans. He hesitates, carefully deciding what to say.
"I am not a racist. I don't have anything against Showans or Dankukians or anybody else. I just think that our peoples can not exist together peacefully and believe in an ethic Kazulian-Dundorfic state."
Udvanger spends the rest of the conversation monologizing about the dangers of "the left". He speaks more carefully than Frankenstein himself, not wanting to be called a "fascist" and preferring the term "conservative nationalist" (and yet can not precisely describe the difference between the two words).
Castle Frankenstein, the former estate of Theodor Lynden Frankenstein's Hulstrian ancestors, as seen from the border tripoint.Back on the street, we meet the pastor, who refuses to tell us his name.
"God trusts in Frankenstein. I will vote for him and tell everybody who asks to do the same", says the young man, in anticipation of the Storting election.
"If I would be given the opportunity to change the vote results, I would do it. It's God's will. Have a nice day in our beautiful town."
The pastor must go home; lunch is waiting.
Kristjan Lønner, senior journalist