Jomhuri - Albactana's Premier News Source

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What is Jomhuri?

Jomhuri (Republic) is the largest newspaper in Albactana with an estimated circulation of 7.2 million copies per day. The newspaper is affiliated with the nations ruling Republican People's Party. Jomhuri was founded as an underground newspaper in 1923 after the Jarakanaj shut down its predecessor, the Arbazor Herald. Jomhuri's first 30 years were slow & painful with very small sales however in 1951 when opposition to the regime of the Jarakanaj began to take off the newspaper began to grow rapidly and by early 1953 the newspaper sold almost 4 million copies per week but when the Jarakanaj massacred thousands of protesters in the 1956 nationwide democracy protests the newspapers circulation shrunk once again. In 1960 when hundreds of thousands of protesters stormed & occupied the Jarakanaj's compound, Jomhuri was finally granted the freedom to publish without persecution & circulation hit 18 million per week, which was almost as many copies as 3/4 of the nations population at the time. In 1964 Jomhuri aided the stoking of the revolutionary embers when almost 70% of the population voted for a pro-democracy party in the nation's first elections, however once again the Jarakanaj crushed the freedom the people had found. From 1964 to 1967 the paper was once again oppressed by the government but despite this growth continued. In mid-August 1967 when millions of people from all political  backgrounds took to the streets in the largest uprising the nation has ever seen Jomhuri was once again on the front lines fighting for freedom & it succeeded. On June 27th 1968 the Jarakanaj was forced to flee the country as people overpowered his security forces and stormed government buildings nationwide. After this Jomhuri worked closely with the new Socialist Provisional Government to bring about a true democracy for Albactana but this was stopped when the Council for an Islamic Albactana declared war on the Socialist Provisional Government and proclaimed the whole of the nation an Islamic Republic. The following 5 months devastated Albactana with almost 430,000 people killed by the fighting. Following this Jomhuri's worst period of oppression began when the Islamic Republic began a nationwide purge of anyone opposed to their rule with almost 900,000 people from the military to the judiciary to the press to the business communities taken in the dead of night or in the light of day and executed or imprisoned. Jomhuri had been destroyed and all hopes of democracy in Albactana seemed to have been destroyed. In 1974 the last opposition within the military managed to overthrow the Islamic Republic and for the next 6 years the nation was under a provisional military-led government. On March the 11th 1980 the constitution of the first Republic came into effect and Jomhuri was re-founded by supporters of the newly created Republic People's Party (Hisba Sheba Jumhurrita) to advocate for the secular republic and it's values. Since then Jomhuri has been the nation's largest newspaper growing to its peak of 10.2 million copies sold per day in 2002.

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Child Poverty in Albactana Falls to Lowest Level in History

The National Statistics Office of Albactana has today annoucned that Albactana's child poverty rate has fallen to 26.1%, the lowest level since records began. This means that around 5.7 million of the nations 22 million people aged 14 and under live in poverty. This is a rapid decrease since the year 2000 when the number of children in poverty fell below half of the population under the age of 14 for the first time ever. However, there is still so much work that needs to be done to get rid of child poverty from Albactana. Despite the positive statistic the NSO offers us independent sources estimate that still up to 60% of children in Albactana are at a risk of poverty. Obviously the fact they are not in poverty is a good thing however we must not forget that as recently as 2014 the government changed the definition of poverty which drastically lowered the rate of poverty within Albactana. This helps no one and only makes it so that even more families who would, by first world standards, be classed as poor are not receiving the help they deserve.

The government must stop projecting an image of decreasing inequality to the world as this is far from the truth. The one thing these statistics do concede is that almost 60% of the nations rural children are living in poverty and this figure has barely budged since 2007. The government is turning its back on these children in favour of the urban poor and their children. We can not stand for this. All children deserve an equal chance and the government is denying too many children this. On average rural families have between 3 and 4 children and as the number of children that urban families have continues to fall these children will eventually be noticed when the child poverty rate begins to increase.

Albactana has a choice. We can either act now to stop poverty in rural areas and remove the risk of poverty from all children or we can ignore them and allow for a generation to grow up with resentment for the government that ignored their cries for help and left them to fend for themselves. The government knows which path it should take but it also has it's reasons to not take this path.