Open Letter to David Cameron from South African Barrister Re: Myrtle Cothil

Open Letter to +David Cameron from South African Barrister Re: Myrtle Cothil

To: The Rt Hon. David Cameron MP, Prime Minister

I feel compelled to address you on behalf of one Ms Myrtle Cothil. This missive is motivated purely on compassionate grounds, and was written without instructions after I read about the plight in which this sickly 92 year old South African, who presently resides in the UK with her daughter, one Mary Willis.

I understand that Ms Cothil is represented in the UK by a barrister, one Jan Doerfel.  

To save time, I quote from a News 24 article in which I learned of Ms Cothil's plight, and which so moved me that I felt compelled to write this letter.

"Johannesburg – A 92-year-old South African woman, who sufferers from a chronic disease, could die from a broken heart if she is deported back to the country from the United Kingdom.
Myrtle Cothill's daughter Mary Wills said the deportation would "tear strips out of our hearts and probably would kill my mother".
Cothill has no family in South Africa to help care for her.
Her barrister Jan Doerfel has launched an online petition to call on the UK to grant Cothill leave to remain in the country.

Doerfel said Cothill has been living with her 66-year-old daughter Wills, a British citizen, since she arrived in the country in February 2014.
In the petition, Doerfel said Cothill suffers from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and macular degeneration which causes the loss of sight.
Cothill cannot walk unaided, has a chronic cough, poor vision, has difficulty hearing and is experiencing increasing confusion, he said.
"She is unable to care or cook for herself and relies on her daughter for emotional and physical support; Wills helps her mother with her personal care, housework, cooking and shopping."
Doerfel said Wills and her husband David, who is also British, cannot move to South Africa to look after Cothill because they have no right to live in the country.
David Wills also suffers from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and Parkinson’s disease, leaving him unable to travel as both diseases affect his mobility and breathing.
"Both David Wills’ and Cothill’s medical conditions are degenerative and likely to deteriorate further in the future," Doerfel said.
He said the Home Office refused to allow Cothill to remain in the UK and the courts did not believe they could overturn the office's decision.
"This would rip the family apart and leave them broken-hearted," Doerfel said.
He said the UK introduced an immigration rule in 2012 on adult dependant relatives which made it "almost impossible" for British citizens to bring their elderly parents to live with them during their "declining years".
In the petition, Mary Wills is quoted as saying: "My mother just cannot live on her own and emotionally, for her as well as for myself, it would really tear strips out of our hearts and probably would kill my mother [and maybe myself as well]."
In a letter addressed to the Home Office, Doerfel asked that Cothill's leave to remain in the UK be granted and that the immigration rule be amended to allow for the previous rule on family reunion to be put back in place."

I mention in passing that I do not know any of the parties or their legal Counsel at all, nor had I even heard of them until I read article ten or so minutes ago.

It is evident from the above article that Ms Cothill, who is  a sickly 92 year old woman faces deportation to South Africa subsequent to a decision taken by The Home Office in the UK. Ms Cothill will not only be removed from her family and the care she has been receiving from them, but once here in South Africa, she apparently has no family to care for her.

For what it's worth, I humbly request that you immediately familiarise yourself with Ms Cothill's circumstances with a view to ascertaining whether anything can be done to keep her with her family in what little time she has left.

I feel certain that once this dire case are considered, special and sad circumstances involved will warrant treating this case as an exception to any generally applicable rule on humanitarian grounds. In this regard it must be borne in mind that Ms Cothill's daughter and husband are British citizens and this case also affects their human rights.

Yours faithfully

Siegfried Walther
Advocate of the High Court of South Africa
Chambers
Cape Town.

+Home Office

+jan doerfel

Pope unwise to Wade into US Politics

THE POPE WAS UNWISE TO WADE INTO US POLITICS

+Republican  residential Front runner Donald Trump has during his campaign repeatedly promised to build a wall between the US & Mexico in order to ensure control of the US Southern Border.

Today, the Pope visited the US Mexico Border. Afterwards, made the comment that anyone who wished to build a wall between people instead of a bridge was not a proper Christian.

In my view it was probably unwise of the Pope to allow his host to take him to a place which is presently one of the most controversial topics in the US election at present. Uncontrolled immigration into the US, particularly from Mexico, and the notoriously insecure border between the US and Mexico are subjects on which most US politicians have strong views, and this certainly applies to the Presidential candidates from both parties.

Furthermore, the Pope was wrong to express a view that anyone who builds or favours the building of a wall on a the US / Mexico border is not a Christian.

As a matter of principle, there is nothing wrong with a sovereign state wishing to have a secure border and to seek to exercise proper control of those wishing to enter the a country through proper border posts.

The UK, for example, is not party to the Schengen Agreement in the European Community and it exercises strict control of those entering the UK at its border posts.

The absence of such control has in fact presented the remainder of Europe with enormous problems during the present refugee crises. Many European countries are no doubt envious of the UK's present position where it retains control of how many refugees it will accept.

Some people may favour a world where there are no borders and others may favour strict border controls. There is nothing particularly un-Christian about the latter position.

At the same time, Donald Trump's remarks that the Pope's comment was disgraceful is uncalled for. He ought instead to have used the word unfortunate or regrettable to describe the Pontiff's remark.

Even Jeb Bush, after declining to comment upon the Pope's remark, went on to say he favoured an effective US / Mexico border which might require a Wall.  

If the Pope wished to comment about Trump's Christianity, he ought perhaps to have referred to the host of other derogatory remarks Donald Trump made regarding Mexicans & Muslims, many of which don't immediately strike one as being particularly Christian.


Siegfried Walther 2016

Also: Link to FBI v Apple. Court no power to make the Order it did. http://siegfriedwalther.blogspot.co.za/2016/02/apple-v-fbi-court-no-power-to-order.html

+Donald Trump

+Jeb Bush

+The Pope Benedict XVI Fan Club

+US Election

Apple vs FBI Court no power to order Apple to create a Fix! (Article updated. New US Case)

+Apple vs +FBI  The FBI federal bureau of investigation 

**** Updated - Recent US Court decision agrees with my legal opinion almost word for word!!!

I refer to the FIN24.com article which gives the background to the legal battle between Apple and the FBI. I quote the article below for convenience http://www.fin24.com/Tech/News/apple-fights-dangerous-order-to-hack-iphone-20160218 

En Passant - iPHONES MUST BE VERY SECURE

The first point to make is that by opposing the Court Order, Apple are drawing attention to just how secure their iPhones apparently are.

Consider the vast resources available to the FBI and the wide array of top computer experts the FBI would be able to call upon. Clearly it did call upon its experts, which surely also included several former hackers who instead of being imprisoned for other offences, were instead offered a chance to repent by working for the FBI for a few years.

That the FBI were forced to approach the Court is a tribute to the security provisions Apple introduced to protect the information their clients store on their iPhones.

Legal Opinion - THE COURT ORDER SEEMS UNDULY WIDE IN THAT IT SEEKS TO COMPEL APPLE TO ACTUALLY CREATE A SOLUTION!

The debate about whether the rights of privacy of individual iPhone users should give way to the search and seizure rights of law enforcement agency in terrorism and other criminal cases misses what I consider to be the main point. The Court, in my view, does not have the power to make the order it did in the first place.

Consider the following statement from Apple.

"The US government has asked us for something we simply do not have, and something we consider too dangerous to create. They have asked us to build a backdoor to the iPhone," Apple said.
"In the wrong hands, this software - which does not exist today - would have the potential to unlock any iPhone in someone's physical possession."

It would be one thing if the FBI could have shown that Apple already have a fix or backdoor which might allow the user of such fix to unlock any iPhone. I suspect that such a scenario represents the high watermark of the intended limits of the Order granted.

But since such fix or backdoor apparently does not exist, I suspect that no Court has the power to actually order Apple or any other manufacturer to in fact create such a fix. 

The order as it stands falls short of an actual order to create a fix, but to the extent that it might be so interpreted, I am certain that Apple will win the case on that very point.

Since the FBI do not have a contract with Apple to create the fix, the obligation to create a fix cannot arise from Contract.

Since creating a secure phone is not a delict / Tort, there can be no obligation to create a fix in delict or tort law.

A US Court might have wide powers under US security legislation or the Constitution to order third parties to comply with legal search & seizure Orders, which would include  Apple having to hand over a fix or  backdoor "key" if there was one in existence.  However one looks at it, such an order is one which compels a third party to permit, grant or assist the FBI to gain access. In these types of orders, the word "assist" must be narrowly construed. It is the FBI who have the duty to search and it is they who have the power to seize. The third party's role to assist is limited to acts like unlocking premises in the third party's care, handing over documents in the third party's care, or providing the FBI with the means to access those documents in the third party's care etc. etc.

An order to create such a solution, however, is another matter entirely. It would be akin to sanctioning a form of slave labour, which would be rendered involuntarily and on an unpaid basis. Such an order cannot be enforceable. Even if the Order provided for Apple to be compensated for their efforts, the fact that Apple would have no choice in the matter would be unconstitutional in my view.

The line between an order compelling a party to permit access or to create the means to enable access might seem arbitrary, but it is not.  The FBI has the job of fighting crime and terrorism in the US. A scenario where a Court has the power to in fact impose a positive duty on citizens to do the FBI's Job for it is too ghastly to contemplate.

Let me explain by means of another law enforcement situation which seems to occur in US movies from time to time. Assume that a police office has the power, in an emergency, to ask a citizen to step out of his car and to permit the officer to "commandeer" it. If such right to commandeer indeed exists in the US, this would be one thing. However, a police officer cannot simply hop into the passenger seat of the car, flash his badge to the driver, announce that he is commandeering it and then order the driver to "Follow that car!" The drive would be entitled to refuse! Why? It's not the citizen's job, and in a free country, one cannot arbitrarily be ordered to do someone else's job!

 Fred Kaplan in @Slate http://slate.me/1Ud1H9T  argues this, though:

As Shane Harris reported in the Daily Beast, Apple has unlocked phones, at the government’s request or under court order, at least 70 times since 2008. In doing so, Apple implicitly accepted the principle that the government has the right, under court-approved circumstances, to get inside Apple-made phones. Cook designed the iOS8 operating system in 2014 precisely to evade further requests: Under the new system, the user sets the code, so if the government asks Apple executives to unlock a phone, they can honestly say they can’t. Now the FBI has devised a way around the problem by asking Apple to shut off the data-wipe feature, so the phone can be unlocked with brute force. The technique is different, but the outcome—letting the government into a phone designed by Apple—is the same. Cook may have changed his mind about the government’s right to his products’—his customers’—contents; he may regret ever cooperating in the first place. But that doesn’t negate the fact that Apple accepted the principle in the past, and the company’s identity and ownership haven’t changed in the interim.

 I disagree.

In the first instance, relief sought by the FBI and granted by the Court is different from past instances. Apple are being asked to go further than they have in the past... to DO or CREATE a solution as opposed to simply PERMITTING  or Assisting the FBI to gain access to the iPhone using existing methods.

Secondly, If I'm wrong, however, to the extent that Apple's conduct could be argued to be DOING or CREATING something, there are two answers.
Either the Court orders amounted to Judicial overreach,  i.e. the Orders went further than Constitutionally permitted OR Apple voluntarily chose to provide assistance in excess of that specified in past orders.

Neither of the above prevents Apple from challenging the illegality of the present order.  If the present order goes further than the law permits, and it is challenged, then the argument that Apple may have complied with previous such orders won't assist the FBI.

Also the fact that Apple may have chosen to provide assistance to the FBI which may have exceeded the strict terms of past Court Orders cannot amount to a valid lawful waiver by Apple of its constitutional right to now challenge an existing Order it deems to be unlawful. The question of whether or the Government has the right to get inside iPhones is cannot be determined by having regard to Apple's past compliance with such orders.

The importance of the above challenge is that the Government bears the onus of proving that it is entitled to an order as far reaching as the one it obtained. Only once it can establish that, which in my view it cannot, could the defence Apple raises, set out below, be contemplated.

Quite apart from the above, is the argument Apple have already raised about the rights of their existing customers to the security the iPhone presently offers. Here the onus would presumably be on Apple. Also, since there are pros and cons on both sides, the argument is more difficult.

Siegfried Walther  18 Feb 2016

UPDate: See recent US Court decision. 29/2/2016 (Further Below) Virtually everything I said, word for word and I'm not even a US Lawyer.

 

 

 

FIN24.COM ARTICLE http://www.fin24.com/Tech/News/apple-fights-dangerous-order-to-hack-iphone-20160218

Apple CEO Tim Cook speaks at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco. (Jeff Chiu, AP)

       

San Francisco - Apple has rejected a judge's order to help the FBI break into an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino shooters, warning it was "too dangerous" to create such a backdoor to the smartphones.
US magistrate Judge Sheri Pym ordered Apple on Tuesday to provide "reasonable technical assistance" to the FBI, including disabling an auto-erase feature after too many unsuccessful attempts are made to unlock the iPhone 5C.
Federal prosecutors had filed a motion requesting Apple's help after the FBI failed to crack the phone's code two months into the investigation into the December rampage.
Syed Farook, a US citizen, and his Pakistani wife Tashfeen Malik gunned down 14 people at an office party in San Bernardino, California, before they were killed in a shootout with police.
But Apple said it would fight the judge's order, firing the latest shot in a growing debate over encryption pitting the government against tech companies.
"The United States government has demanded that Apple take an unprecedented step which threatens the security of our customers," Apple chief executive Tim Cook said in a statement on the company's website.
"We oppose this order, which has implications far beyond the legal case at hand."
Cook said it was too risky to provide the requested software because it could allow ill-intentioned individuals to unlock any iPhone and raises major privacy concerns.
"The US government has asked us for something we simply do not have, and something we consider too dangerous to create. They have asked us to build a backdoor to the iPhone," Apple said.
"In the wrong hands, this software - which does not exist today - would have the potential to unlock any iPhone in someone's physical possession.
"While the government may argue that its use would be limited to this case, there is no way to guarantee such control," he said, adding that Apple has cooperated with the FBI thus far.
By disabling the security features, the FBI would be able to attempt as many different password combinations as needed before gaining access to the phone.
It was the property of the San Bernardino County Department of Public Health, which employed Farook, and the authority had agreed to the search of the phone.
'Chilling'
Pym ordered Apple to provide software that would only run on the device in question, or any other technological means to access its data.
But Apple said it was impossible to create such a tool that could only be used once, on one phone.
"Once created, the technique could be used over and over again, on any number of devices," Apple said.
"In the physical world, it would be the equivalent of a master key, capable of opening hundreds of millions of locks - from restaurants and banks to stores and homes. No reasonable person would find that acceptable."
The US government is concerned that commercially-available encryption benefits criminals.
Tech companies, intent on securing the trust of consumers after government spying revelations made by Edward Snowden, have been reluctant to be seen as helping authorities spy on users.
"We can find no precedent for an American company being forced to expose its customers to a greater risk of attack," Apple said.
"The implications of the government's demands are chilling."
"If the government can use the All Writs Act to make it easier to unlock your iPhone, it would have the power to reach into anyone's device to capture their data."
Cook warned that if Apple complied with the order, the government could demand surveillance software to intercept, access health and financial data, track users' location or access a phone's microphone or camera without the user's knowledge.
"We are challenging the FBI's demands with the deepest respect for American democracy and a love of our country," Cook added.
US Attorney Eileen Decker had earlier called the order "another step - a potentially important step - in the process of learning everything we possibly can about the attack in San Bernardino."
FBI Director James Comey revealed last week that investigators had not been able to crack open the phone two months into the investigation.
"It affects our counterterrorism work," he said.

See Greenwald & McLaughlin article https://theintercept.com/2016/02/29/apple-wins-major-court-victory-in-its-battle-against-fbi-in-a-case-similar-to-san-bernardino/

Apple scored a major legal victory in its ongoing battle against the FBI on Monday when a federal magistrate judge in New York rejected the U.S. government’s request as part of a drug case to force the company to help it extract data from a locked iPhone. The ruling from U.S. Magistrate Judge James Orenstein was issued as part of the criminal case against Jun Feng, who pleaded guilty in October to drug charges. It is a significant boost to Apple’s well-publicized campaign to resist the FBI’s similar efforts in the case of the San Bernardino killers.
In the case that gave rise to Monday’s ruling, the Drug Enforcement Administration had seized — but, even after consultation with the FBI, claimed it was unable to access — Feng’s iPhone 5. The DEA and FBI said they could not overcome security measures embedded in Apple’s operating system. The government thus filed a motion seeking an order requiring “Apple to assist” the investigation “under the authority of the All Writs Act” — the same 1789 law the FBI is invoking in the San Bernardino case — by “help[ing] the government bypass the passcode security.” Apple objected, noting that there were nine other cases currently pending in which the government was seeking a similar order.
Judge Orenstein applied previous legal decisions interpreting the AWA and concluded that the law does not “justif[y] imposing on Apple the obligation to assist the government’s investigation against its will.” In a formulation extremely favorable to Apple, the judge wrote that the key question raised by the government’s request is whether the AWA allows a court “to compel Apple — a private party with no alleged involvement in Feng’s criminal activity — to perform work for the government against its will.”
The court ruled that the law permits no such result — both because relevant law contains limits on what companies like Apple are required to do, and because Congress never enacted any such obligations. Moreover, the judge said of the government’s arguments for how the AWA should be applied: “The implications of the government’s position are so far-reaching — both in terms of what it would allow today and what it implies about congressional intent in 1789 — as to produce impermissibly absurd results.”

+Apple vs FBI
+FBI vs Apple

#ApplevsFBI
#FBIvsApple

Speaker In SA Parly must be a Judge #SONA2016

NEED FOR AN UNBAISED SPEAKER IN SOUTH AFRICAN PARLIAMENT

South Africans have become accustomed to chaotic scenes of disorderly conduct in Parliament in the past couple of years. The recent State of the Nation address (#SONA2016) is a case in point.  Many blame opposition parties like the EFF for ill-discipline and deliberate disorderly conduct.

In my view, however, the root cause of much of the disorder in parliament can be attributed to the various Speakers. In the first place the Speakers, who are appointed by the ruling party, seem to have difficulty with the concept that once appointed as Speaker, they are required to adopt an even-handed unbiased approach to house proceedings. In this regard, present speakers often fail miserably.

Secondly, the speakers are required to have a thorough understanding of the rules of Parliament and must be able to apply them fairly at all times. It is quite evident that the present Speakers do not have the rules of the House at their fingertips.

There is a need to eliminate any bias in favour of the ruling party by the Speaker. I suggest the following Constitutional Amendment be urgently introduced.

The Speaker, instead of being an MP, elected by the majority of MP's, ought to be a sitting Judge of the High Court, seconded to Parliament on a weekly rotational basis.  

 Not only will a Judge, by virtue of his or her office and training, be far more impartial, a Judge will also be able to make impartial rulings about Parliamentary procedure and this would certainly go a long way to make Parliament more accountable.

If the Judges who sit as Speaker are regularly rotated, sitting only for one week at a time, it will go a long way to addressing any fears that a particular Judge may have undisclosed political loyalties to one party or another.

Of course, a provision to interdict any Judge who fails to act impartially while acting as Speaker, or who has known strong political affiliations from acting as Speaker may be required. A High Court application should be all that is required to remove such Judges from the list of those whose names can be placed on the Duty roster to act as Speaker of Parliament.

In addition, a Judge sitting as Speaker could be empowered to warn Parliament when, in his view, a proposed Bill contains an unconstitutional provision, although he ought not have any power to make a ruling to that effect.

The Judge sitting as Speaker could also make non-binding suggestions as to how Parliament might improve the wording of a Bill so as to give effect to its intention and to avoid ambiguity. This could save the citizens thousands of rands in legal costs in later Court cases to deal with ambiguous legislation or legislation which is worded in manner which has unintended consequences.

Of course, Parliament would be free to ignore the Judge's advice or guidance as to the wording or constitutionally of proposed Bills.
One cannot have a Judge exercising any Judicial powers in a Legislative House. Save for the said practical and sensible right to advise or guide on legislation (which power should be extremely limited) I propose that the Judge would be limited to the exercise of the powers and functions presently exercised by the  Speaker.

I do not believe that this practical amendment would impact negatively on the required separation of the legislative, executive and judicial functions of government.

I accept that in the UK, for example, the tradition that the Speaker is elected by the House of Commons is long standing and it works there. However, it does not work in South Africa. And for this reason, I have suggested that the South African Constitution be amended as above.

 Siegfried Walther 2016

Also By Siegfried Walther: In Guards We Trust
http://siegfriedwalther.blogspot.co.za/2016/02/in-guards-we-trust-chapter-1-free.html

 MH370 & AF 447
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/526079

+Democratic Alliance 
+Parliament of the Republic of South Africa 
+Economic Freedom Fighters 
+African National Congress 

In Guards we Trust - Chapter 1 - Free Historical eBook by Siegfried Walther

Chapter 1 – The siege of the summer of 1792

      King Julien III of Montuga seldom varied his daily routine. He would appear like clockwork for breakfast each morning at precisely nine o’clock. After an hour, he would retire from the royal dining room and head for the Chamber of Knights. There, two footmen would ensure that the large double doors were open to allow for his majesty’s access to the palace’s main balcony. The king enjoyed spending twenty minutes in solitude here each day to gather his thoughts, to release any built up flatulence, and to reflect upon any of a number of decisions he, as sovereign, was required to make from time to time.
         Not that the king spent much time agonising over decisions and choices, however. On the contrary, such was his majesty’s penchant for tradition and convention that his edicts and policies were usually as predictable as was his daily routine. Nor were the services of a clairvoyant required to safely predict that if change ever threatened to drop in on the tiny kingdom of Montuga, the King would be last in line to embrace it.
          But change had come to Montuga. And, on that morning, it again shattered the post-breakfast tranquillity the king had become accustomed to enjoying.
           A large crowd of protestors, who were congregated outside the palace gates, had taken to jeering and heckling every time they spotted the king on the balcony. The king ignored their insults and abuse. Instead he aimed a telescope at the high walls comprising the perimeter of the palace grounds without focusing on anything in particular. He was determined to conceal his irritation with an air of indifference.
           The king was accustomed to making allowances for the occasional display of unseemly conduct he encountered during his infrequent interactions with poorer commoners in earlier times. As a young prince, he had learned that the peasantry were unused to the rules of etiquette which not only moulded the conduct of the aristocracy, but also regulated the behaviour of those who served them.
           Despite the divisions imposed upon the nobility and the peasantry in Montuga by demeanour, attire, position and by birth, everyone had, at least until recently, always been united by a near-instinctive respect for the authority of the monarchy. And so it was hardly surprising that the king found the protestors’ new-found irreverence for royalty to be particularly ominous.
           Egalitarian views embraced by leading rebels in neighbouring France had recently found favour amongst a growing number of Montugan peasants. Inspired by these beliefs, and by peasant uprisings in France, local peasants had begun to organise demonstrations of their own. As far as the king was concerned, this served as further proof, as if any were needed, that the popular uprisings against the monarchy in France held nothing good in store for the little kingdom of Montuga.
          Mind you, the king did not believe himself to be in any immediate danger. The perimeter wall was high and to boot its walkway was regularly patrolled by royal guards. Other royal guards occupied defensive positions along its ramparts. And in the courtyard below, a squad of mounted guards stood alongside their steeds, facing the crowd. The royal guards were equipped with all that they required to restore unhindered access to the palace - save for that which they needed most – the king’s command.
          It was the fourth day of the siege. Most of the protestors, who numbered several thousand, were shielded from the king’s scrutiny by the height of the perimeter wall. The remainder were visible through two massive iron gates set in the lower half of the wall.
          Seemingly invigorated by the king’s presence, the crowd started to chant once again.
          ‘One man!’ a smaller group shouted.
          ‘One vote!’ the entire crowd roared in response.
           The thunderous din reverberated around the palace’s cobblestoned courtyard.
           The king did not particularly mind the chants, although a wider repertoire would have proved less annoying. He resisted the temptation to embark upon a royal walkabout during which he thought he might introduce himself to the protesters as the one man, appointed by God, to exercise that one vote.
            Notwithstanding the siege, officials and servants within the palace continued going about their usual activities. However, the general mood within the palace was anything but normal. Everyone was aware that many demonstrations throughout France had turned violent. Many wondered whether local demonstrators would also resort to violence if their demands were not addressed.
            On the first day of the siege the king had received a supposedly confidential report from a royal guardsman that the latter had spotted about a dozen masked gunmen on horseback through his telescope. It took less than an hour before this news became the main topic of conversation throughout every corner of the palace. The ominous riders, who had apparently lurked about the rear of the protesting crowd, did not present themselves again. Their whereabouts remained shrouded in as much mystery as were their intentions.
            Most protestors were armed only with picks, shovels and other makeshift weapons. They used these implements to bang on the palace gates, seemingly indifferent to the array of muskets and cannons aimed in their direction.
            For the present, each side adhered to an uneasy, unspoken truce in which hostilities were limited only to the threat of violence.
The king feared that if he ordered the royal guards to fire on the protestors, it might invite a violent response from sympathetic republicans in France.
           Despite that the latter were preoccupied with their own efforts to depose the French monarchy, nothing prevented some of them from pausing to assist the Montugan peasants. If French republicans turned up in significant numbers to fight alongside a Montugan peasant army, the king’s five hundred royal guards were unlikely to prevail. The king was determined to avoid playing into the hands of any foreigners who might be plotting his kingdom’s return to French rule.
               The protestors, in turn, also shunned violence in the hope it would limit the king’s use of his royal guard to little more than sabre rattling. They also avoided forcing the hand of the king by restricting their siege of the palace to daylight hours.
          ‘May I join you, your majesty?’ a familiar voice enquired from behind him.
          ‘Indeed you may, your grace,’ the king replied before turning to face Duke Emile Le Riche. The latter, as commander of the royal guard, enjoyed special leave to enter the king’s presence without announcement and at will. The duke’s shiny new boots squeaked as he stepped onto the balcony. The duke removed his hat and waved it before the king as he bowed. He replaced his hat, which completed his immaculate uniform.
          Both men were silent for a while as they surveyed the unfolding events.
          Years of experience had taught the king that even when his old friend had something pressing on his mind, he would always wait for royalty to open the discussion.
           ‘You have news?’ the king probed eventually as he considered the shadows cast by the two of them on the marble tiles.    
            It was a splendid Mediterranean morning in the summer of 1792. It piqued him to detect how one shadow reflected a man in good shape for his advanced years whilst the expanded circumference of the other stood in stark contrast to it. At sixty-six, the duke was fourteen years older than the king. Unlike the king, however, the duke still had most of his hair albeit that the ravages of time had turned it white.
             ‘I regret, bad news, your majesty. The protests in France have become more violent. I have received reports that in certain regions aristocrats have been dragged from their estates and that some of them have even been executed in the streets. Looting is said to be widespread.’
             ‘And what of Paris?’ the king inquired while fingering a pouch in his robe. He produced his pipe and a sachet containing tobacco.
              ‘The situation there is tense, but seemingly still under control. Sporadic riots have been subdued. But King Louis’ position remains perilous. Some nobles are believed to have joined the rebels. The loyalty of the lower ranks French army is rumoured to be divided between the king and the revolutionaries. No-one is certain who has majority support. The rebels have convened a National Assembly. King Louis is under pressure to recognise it.’
          ‘They will end up like the English. With a prime minister,’ king Julien observed glumly. ‘I warned Louis it would only be a matter of time before his support for the Americans and their appalling revolution would backfire on him. However, there is no reasoning with the French if they sense an opportunity for a war with the English.’
           ‘Your majesty, it is my fear the French monarchy may not survive in any form at all.’ The duke’s tone was respectful. ‘The wars waged by the French monarchy over past decades have impoverished the kingdom. Famine is now commonplace across France. The hungry masses are in no mood to compromise with the privileged. Many in France are calling for the total elimination of the nobility and the monarchy. Moreover, the nobility’s prospects of survival are not aided by an increasing number of pro-republican leaders who consider themselves as infinitely more deserving custodians of the nobility’s considerable wealth.’ The duke paused before adding: ‘And I use the term “custodians” advisedly.’
             ‘Peasants who presume to replace a king are mindless fools. A king is a veritable fountain of indispensable, irreplaceable wisdom, accumulated over generations, without which no hope for proper government can exist.’ The king stared aloofly at the crowd as he spoke.
            ‘My concern, majesty, is King Louis could be deposed or, heaven forbid, executed. Montuga owes its existence to its Treaty with France. Republicans who oppose monarchy on principle are unlikely to remove one monarchy in Paris whilst tolerating another situated on what they will claim is also French territory. If the republicans seize power in France, they will surely renounce the treaty of Montuga.’ Anther pause. ‘I would counsel that we need to be prepared for the consequences of such an eventuality.’
          ‘Your grace overlooks international convention,’ the king replied.
           ‘Your majesty?’ The duke’s eyebrows lifted slightly.
              ‘A treaty is binding on a king’s successors. Ours has been adhered to by France for more than two centuries and cannot simply be flouted now.’ The king gestured in the duke’s direction with the tip of his pipe. ‘And, there is something else, your grace. Montuga enjoys diplomatic relations with most European monarchies. They will take a dim view of any French intervention in Montuga. It could even lead to war. Lord Graveny told me only yesterday that the Prussians and the Austrians are poised to invade France to restore Louis to his rightful position if he should be deposed.’
           Lord Graveny was Britain’s ambassador to Montuga. The king paused, producing a handkerchief into which he coughed.
           ‘Sooner or later, any new regime in France, if there is to be one, will be obliged to seek international recognition,’ the king explained. ‘In Europe, international recognition comprises of recognition by the European monarchies.’
           ‘Majesty, a new French government may pay lip service to the treaty for a time. But I fear this will be solely be for the sake of appearances. And it is unlikely to last. Also, French republicans may in any event conspire to undermine Montugan independence by indirect means.’ The duke discretely waved a gloved hand in the direction of the protestors.
            ‘Surely your grace does not suggest French revolutionaries are behind these protests in Montuga?’
              ‘At this stage, your majesty, only two things can be said to be certain. Our protests are an undeniable spill-over from those in France. Secondly, and at the very least, these protests surely carry the approval of the republican revolutionaries in France.’
             ‘I’ll grant you that, your grace. But the difference is our protests have been peaceful.’
              ‘With respect, majesty, it appears peaceful only because our protestors seem agreed on testing the water by calling only for constitutional monarchy in Montuga. This is good and well for so long as such unity of purpose persists. However, my concern is that the protesting mob includes a pro-republican faction who view constitutional monarchy as the thin edge of the wedge.’
                ‘How large is this local republican faction?’ The King inquired. ‘Do you know?’
                  The duke raised his voice slightly in response to a fresh round of chanting.
               ‘My information is that the Montugan protestors who favour constitutional monarchy are estimated to outnumber the pro-republican protestors by over two to one. For this reason, the republicans are unlikely to mount any challenge against your majesty’s royal guard on their own. Instead, word is they are waiting to see whether the republicans in France succeed in deposing King Louis. If, heaven forbid, they succeed, local republicans are certain to encourage or accept the support of any new republican government which may arise in France. A French invasion is likely follow. Montuga’s small royal guard would be no match for a republican army or navy from France.’
               ‘Be all that as it may, I will never countenance a republic in Montuga. Unlike Louis, I have not dragged this kingdom into war. Instead, Montuga has prospered and most of my subjects live comfortably and have enough to eat. I have caused Monte Vista to become the leading trading port in Europe. I know not who lurks behind these protests, but I believe the people will soon grow bored and tire of it, and all of this will pass.’ The king grimaced before continuing. ‘Mark my words though, your grace, if the republicans do take power in France, they will destroy it. And the devastation they will leave behind will leave no-one in doubt that what we have here in Montuga is best for everyone.’
                ‘There are some who say that the British compromise of constitutional monarchy is an effective model of stable government,’ the duke ventured.
                 ‘Stable government?’ The king glared at the duke. But his frown soon gave way to a wicked grin. ‘You could be right. After all, if people choose to be represented by a parliament filled to capacity with horse’s arses, who am I to deny that this would indeed constitute a stable government.’ The king sniggered, and directed a jubilant glance at the duke.
                 ‘My only concern, majesty, is that we should be prepared for all contingencies,’ the duke replied earnestly. ‘We should at least have a strategy in place for the evacuation of the monarchy from Montuga should circumstance demand it.’
                ‘Such an evacuation is unthinkable. Has the French royal family fled Versailles?’ the king asked.
                ‘Not as yet, your majesty. But I am aware that King Louis has been counselled that his safety and that of the royal family cannot be guaranteed if they remain in Paris.’ The duke’s expression remained solemn.
                ‘It would be a disgrace if the Bourbons fled from Versailles. One can only imagine what the rabble would do to that magnificent palace if such an unimaginable event occurred.’ The king coughed again. ‘The Garibaldis have been on this throne for two hundred years. I am not about to bring shame on my family by relinquishing this palace.’ He paused for effect. ‘I am prepared to fight and if necessary, to die to defend the Garibaldi heritage.’ A slight smile creased the king’s face. ‘That is, of course, if ill health does not take me first.’ After puffing on his pipe for several moments he continued. ‘And I will tell you another thing, your grace. I shall not allow the peasants to block the palace gates indefinitely. I treat my subjects fairly. They pay little enough tax to the crown. And this is how I am thanked.’
            ‘What of Prince Ruan and Princess Renate, your majesty?’
A frown creased the king’s forehead as he considered the lot of the crown prince and that of his daughter. Several moments passed before he replied.
           ‘I am prepared to sacrifice myself. But their situation is another matter. If it should come to the worst, the survival of the next generation of Garibaldis and the monarchy itself must outweigh the defence of the palace.’ The king placed his hand on the duke’s arm. ‘If need be, I shall remain here and shall fight until the end. As sovereign, that is my duty. But I shall look to you, your grace, to ensure that my children are safely evacuated. You are to prepare a contingency plan. I do not know if it is written that I will join my dearly departed wife in the afterlife. But one thing is certain: If heaven is my destiny, and if I arrive there prematurely accompanied by my children, my wife will not be speaking to me.’


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