There are two ways to make the tzdb more consistent: either merging time zones that are alike since 1970, or splitting time zones as much as possible. The latter was the pre-2014 approach and much harder to maintain (after all, should we split time zones just for newly discovered pre-1970 time zone differences?), so the tzdb has gradually switched to the former for a decade. This patch is just a continuation of this ongoing switch.

Alternatively, it might be possible to keep the latter approach but limit the scope so that the maintenance remains doable. For example the tzdb can forgo textual time zone identifiers and declare that downstream projects are responsible for the mapping to the external world (and thus politics). However that would make the tzdb much less useful. The current policy does seem to maximize the value of the database without much trouble (that is, limited to a minor drama) and any change to the policy requires a serious consideration about that. In comparison the forking proposal by Colebourne is at best naive.