The Federation of the Visayas
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The Visayas, also known as the Federation of the Visayas, is an archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. It is situated in the western Pacific Ocean and consists of most of the Visayan group of Islands. The Visayas is bounded by the Sulu Sea to the west, the Philippine Sea to the east, and shares maritime borders with the Philippines to the north, Mait to the northeast, The Waray Republic and the U.N. Governorates of Polynesia the east, Palawan to the west, Mindanao and Zamboanga to the South and Caraga to the Southeast.
The Federation traces its roots not in the All-Bisayan League during the Philippine Insurrection, but instead to the Federal State of the Visayas that was founded by Bisayan Revolutionaries in the 1899 Philippine Revolution against Spain. The desire for a federal form of government among Bisayans have also existed since during the revolutionary times, but was repeatedly shut down by their Tagalog counterparts who desired a more unitary form of governance. During the Philippine Insurrection, the All-Bisayan League were the largest faction in the Visayas region, which allowed them to become the dominant group in the region. Unfortunately, the league was racked with disunity and instability as its leadership was infested with corruption and nepotism. The leadership were also closely connected to the Tagalog Nationalists in Manila, which created fears that the Bisayans might get robbed of their end goal once more, so when the Philippine Anarchy started in June of 2049 the All-Bisayan League fractured and broke into several independent factions that either seek control of their own provinces or desires to form a new national state in the Visayas. For the first few months the Bisayan Federalists were at the brink of defeat, but the resurgence of the communist New People's Army in the region managed to convince most of the factions to unite against the threat, allowing the Federalists to prove themselves as the worthy leaders of the Bisayans by leading the war against the Communists. By September of 2050, the Communist Party was successful pushed out of the Visayas, and the Bisayan Federalists dominate most of the region once more. In order to address the political instability in their ranks, the old leadership of the Federalists were kicked out and replaced by a "Provisional Council" headed by representatives from each faction. This allowed the Bisayans to coordinate their efforts effectively, and allowed the federalists to defeat other national factions in the visayas, namely the Tagalog-led Philippine National Republic and the Madja-as Ultranationalists. By August 2052 the Council stands unopposed in the Visayas, ending the anarchy in the region and allowing the bisayans to start rebuilding their damaged homeland after nearly 3 decades of constant war. In the following month, the Provisional Council announced that the drafting of a constitution is now ongoing and would take two more years of negotiations and several revisions for the council to finally decide that the proposal of the new Federalist Party would be the new constitution: A Parliamentary Form of Government patterned after their British and Danish counterparts. On June 12, 2054, the Federation of the Visayas was proclaimed by the council, with elections for National Office being decided the following weeks with the Federalists winning majority of the Parliament's seats.
In order to fix the stagnated economy, the Federation were the first post-Philippine state in the region to re-open diplomatic and economic relations with other countries as well as the United Nations, who were more than happy to give them economic aid and trade. This allowed the Bisayans to become the fastest growing state in the islands, with their Mindanaon counterparts following them after also opening relations with the world a few months after the Bisayans did. However, conflict with almost start between the two when the state of Misamis seceded from Mindanao and declared their intentions to join the Federation, to which the Bisayan Government agreed and admitted the province into the union. This prompted an invasion by the Mindanaons who deemed the secession as unconstitutional and seeks to reclaim Misamis from the Bisayans. This leads to skirmishes between Bisayan Forces and Mindanaon Forces, and would've escalated if not for the Bisayans immediately sending a ceasefire order and a request to re-negotiate the issue through diplomacy. As of 2058 the State of Misamis remains peacefully divided between the two nations.
In 2055, the Bisayas were able to exercise their unified military might for the first time by aiding the Mait Republic along with Palawan in launching a surprise attack on Communist forces that were attempting to invade Mindoro. The Bisayan Army, known as The National Guards, were one of the most powerful in the region as the Bisayans' high status in the region gave them access to military equipment of other countries, who were willing to give them some of their older equipment such as Sumatra's AMX 13s, Thailand, China, and Japan's old APCs, and other equipment from the Black Market trade in the warlord-torn areas of Russia and Northern China. To prevent the communist north's further expansion, the Bisayans formed a military alliance with Mait, Palawan, and the Republic of the Caraga.
On April of 2056, the Federation's easternmost states in Samar suddenly seceded and formed the Waray Republic, citing that the Waray Peoples lacked representation with the majority Cebuano and Hiligaynon Government. This sparked a secessionist crisis, but fortunately it didn't escalate to open conflict as the Federal Government instead asked for proper negotiations. However, not everyone in the Parliament agreed to the negotiations, with the Democratic-Republican heavily criticizing the Federalists for being "too soft" against the separatists. This leads to a huge deadlock in the negotiations and soon the Federal Government itself faces a crisis as the Dem-Rep began to create a unified coalition against them with other parties in the parliament, mainly the Liberals and the Nationalists. Fortunately for the Federalists, another crisis would start in the latter period of 2058, when a communist uprising in Mait would suddenly lead to a full-scale invasion of Mindoro by the People's Republic. The Federal Government immediately began sending support to the Maitians, and soon the Bisayan National Guards would set foot on Mindoro to face the communists for the first time since the anarchy.
