The Leader is an embodiment of the subjects of the system of global trade. The Leader begins as an admirer and lover of what the Monarch represents. In one sense, the Leader is the native elites who collaborate with the exploitation of their natural resources and their peoples. The ones who sell the idea of collaboration and extraction to their own people in exchange for power and prestige. In another sense, the Leader represents the settler elites who absorbed or displaced the native elites and continued to serve the power of the Monarch, the global system.
In our story, only when the Leader finally realizes that they remain subject to the system does the Leader finally acknowledge how right the Dissenter was. When they do realize that, destroying the idol is the only way to be truly free of the system.