1949 Cattalian Referendum

The 1949 Cattalian Referendum was held to decide whether Cattala should return to a monarchy, following the end of World War Two and its secession from the Republic of Italy. Cattala had a monarchy until the outbreak of the war, and it remained incredibly popular as a symbol of unity and of national identity, which was lacking after five years of occupation and four years of reconstruction.

The referendum was won overwhelmingly by monarchists, with less than 18% of the voting population rejecting the monarchy and supporting republicanism. Turnout was 97%, the highest amount ever recorded in a referendum in Cattala and over 1 million Cattalians favoured the reintroduction of the monarchy to a republican state.

=History=

Main Article: History of Cattala

Inter War Period
Cattala had undergone a revolution after the First World War which resulted in the execution of the Rome-controlled President of Cattala and the re-instatement of the Celestine Monarchy, which had been deposed between 1814 and the Cattalian Revolution by colonial powers. King Charles the Third took the crown in 1919 and led the country until the second world war.

The beginning of World War Two unnerved many Cattalians, with tens of thousands more fleeing the country. For the first year very little happened to the country, and many thought that the war wouldn’t reach them. The military was expanding rapidly, but wasn't strong enough to withstand an Italian, British or German attack.

World War Two
In 1940 hundreds of Italian bombers attacked Celestine and destroyed the military base to the north of the city, wiped out the southern harbour and severely damaged over 4000 homes, shops and Government offices, including the Parliament. German U-Boats and Italian naval submarines surrounded Jennai City and threatened to flatten the biggest population centre in the country unless King Charles surrendered.

The King evacuated his family to a small harbour in Porto D’Italia where they were secretly picked up by a small British plane, which was shot down by the Italian navy. Charles the Third was flown to Rome where he was repatriated with his captured family and they were hung. As the war continued, British and American forces battled the axis frontline in Africa, and in 1943 the Italian troops were pushed back into Cattala where hostile and impoverished islanders assisted the allied soldiers with medicine, food, shelter and ammunition as both the Amadeus Resistance Army (named after the anti-Italian prince) and the British 8th Army battled with the fascists for months until the Allied forces moved into Sicily on July the 10th 1943.

Post War Period
Following the end of World War Two in Cattala, a caretaker government consisting of leading political figures from before the war was set up by Britain and America. The caretaker government, led by Lord Chancellor Harrison, attempted to rebuild Cattala but struggled without parliamentary powers. Most of the country had limited electricity, gas and water supplies and hundreds of thousands of Cattalians were living in poverty and bomb-damaged buildings. Education and healthcare was severely disrupted, with many thousands of children not receiving a primary school education during the war, or in the early stages of the reconstruction.

The capital city, Celestine, was heavily damaged due to it being one of the landing points and most fiercely fought-over points of the island. The national parliament was unusable and the caretaker government was based in an underground bomb shelter, partially built by the Italian regime during its occupation. But by 1948, one year before the referendum, Celestine had been partly rebuilt under the new name of Celeste, and over a million buildings rebuilt or restored. Jennai’s ports were once again operational and entirely new residential complexes were built in the destroyed city centre. Calora was also assisted, as homes were saved and repaired after bombing raids broke seawalls and canal sluices, which resulted in flooding across the city. Most of the funding for this essential work was from the Marshall Plan, Americas' financial assistance scheme that helped European states recover from the war.

=Referendum Groups=

The referendum allowed for numerous groups and political organisations to form and campaign the public. The Government had agreed to hold a referendum on re-instating the monarchy, but had pledged to hold a second referendum on whether to become a republic or not if the first referendum did not show more than 75% support for the monarchy. This allowed three major groups to emerge - the Republican movement, monarchists and the Italian Unification Group.