Empire Rising: Spain

As the time reached 1879, the Philippine Colony was busy dispatching colonizing teams to establish colonies in New Guinea, while in Spain, Carlo was busy holding related meetings with the Cabinet Government.

Of course, this was no ordinary annual government work report meeting, but rather the report meeting for the Spanish Government’s second Five-Year Plan.

The importance of the Five-Year Plan to Spain goes without saying. If Prime Minister Prim’s first five-year development plan stopped the decline of Spain, then the second five-year development plan was meant to put Spain back on the fast track to rapid development, driving industry and economy towards the great powers.

Because the first Five-Year Plan yielded good results, the second Five-Year Plan has garnered high attention from the populace.

As early as the end of last year, people were discussing how much of the second Five-Year Plan had been completed, and the changes in Spain over these five years.

The implementation of the first Five-Year Plan was quite smooth, with Prime Minister Prim at the helm, Spain did not encounter significant issues during its execution.

But only two years into the second Five-Year Plan, Prime Minister Prim was assassinated, and Carlo seized the opportunity to form a Provisional Government until now.

The achievements of various departments in the second five-year development plan are related to whether all the Cabinet members can remain in the Cabinet, Spain’s highest political body, and also to the upcoming elections of the Spanish Cabinet Government this year.

For this reason, from top to bottom across Spain, from the Cabinet Government’s Cabinet Ministers down to every ordinary Spanish citizen, everyone is focusing on the upcoming government summary report meeting for the five-year development plan and the detailed accomplishments of various departments that will be announced after the meeting.

Since the promulgation of the official recruitment assessment system, whether it is the Five-Year Development Plan or tasks assigned by the Kingdom Government to various district governments, the completion and related achievements are vital to the future and destiny of officials.

Those who complete their work quickly and perform well naturally have the opportunity for further promotion. However, if the work is completed slowly, or not at all, at best, the officials will receive poor scores in the performance assessment and cannot be promoted for the next year; at worst, they will be held accountable, or even dismissed.

Carlo takes this very seriously, and even the Upper House and the Cabinet Government will organize corresponding assessment result reviews every year to ensure the reported official assessment results from various district governments are correct, with no cheating.

Any cheating found within the official performance assessments will result in all participants being dismissed and held accountable, with severe cases facing public execution.

Spain has not abolished the death penalty, and for officials who have incurred public wrath, Carlo’s attitude is clear: public execution to placate public anger.

Indeed, the facts have proven that the lampposts in Spain can hang not just capitalists but also officials who embezzle public funds and engage in corruption.

Since the implementation of the official assessment system, over 30 officials have been sentenced to death, with more than 20 of them transferred to Madrid City Center square for public execution.

This act of publicly executing corrupt officials has garnered immense praise for Carlo and the current government from the people.

If a king arbitrarily kills the innocent, people will certainly be terrified. But if this king only kills corrupt officials, the public will not feel fear, but rather applaud.

Any common person would despise corrupt and power-abusing officials, especially since Spain once experienced the dark period under Queen Isabella’s rule, naturally holding no goodwill towards such officials.

Even if only 30 officials are executed in several years, should Carlo execute over 300 officials in one year, as long as there is enough evidence to prove these officials deserved death, the people would not voice any opposition or discontent.

Such measures have proven effective. Especially after publicly executing some officials, even if there were slight discrepancies in the reported official assessment results from various district governments, they would never be too far out of line.

For this reason, all major newspapers and most of the Spanish public pay close attention to the annual publication of official assessment results by various levels of government.

Officials who achieve excellent results would naturally be heavily covered by newspapers, showcasing their political achievements. After learning such news, the people would support these excellently performing officials of their own accord, and regard them as good officials within the Spanish officialdom.

As for officials who receive poor results, the people would cast angry glances and consider them to be corrupt without a second thought, never supporting such individuals in future elections.

Because the people place great trust in the official assessment results, this grants Carlo more influence in Spanish politics.

After all, Carlo controls the Upper House, which is the highest institution of the Spanish official performance assessment system, and can directly decide an official’s future political fate.

For Carlo, he is already capable of determining an official’s life and death with a word. As long as Carlo deems an official corrupt, this official would soon be condemned by everyone, stripped of their position due to public outrage, investigated, and held accountable.