Gundam Unicorn

[Lord_Leperman]

I think it is important to remember some things spoken about near the end of ep2, where Marida talked about Zeon became a guiding light to the people in space to colonies that felt abandoned by Earth. This guiding light had given purpose and meaning to spacenoids, where it had become the only significant social and political representation they had against Earthnoids who had forgotten about them, to the point that Marida even mentioned that it had even replaced religion as a way of life for some IIRC. If this was the case, this would elevated Char as a Messianic figure, who rose up from the dead and become the symbol of salvation for those living in space from the tyranny of Earth. That and with the Sleeves possessing Minerva Zabi, they can assert their legitimacy as the true Zeon by having both Char and the last surviving Zabi under their care, allowing them to rally forth any, if not all remaining Zeon remnants in the earth sphere.

"Zeon will never die" as they say, "for it lives in the hearts of its believers"

Think of it this way, Haman's Neo-Zeon was probably the closest in terms of replicating the original glory of the Principality of Zeon due to the size of the Axis fleet under her disposal, and if it weren't for the civil war with Glemy Toto, they could have maintained their position in ZZ (The Federation were already willing to negotiate for a cease fire agreement prior to the Civil War). That and later we find out that Haman's Minerva Zabi was a fake robot, thus undermining her faction's legitimacy as the successor of Zeon (Char was the one who successfully smuggled the real Minerva out of Haman's hands).

Char had the charisma of being a leader as much as he is reluctant to do so until the events of 0093. If he had the power and strength of the Axis Fleet during it's height, he might have been able to rally some of the colonies to his side and be able to assert the legitimacy of Spacenoid independence from Earth. I don't know what changed him to the point that the only way is to enact a forced migration of Earth though.

One final ingredient is missing: Laplace's Box:

Article 9 of the original Federation Constitution that supposedly granted much more freedom to the colonies and acknowledges the existence of Newtypes, and their right to rule when deemed worthy.

The consequence of this being made public would mean that the Federation HAS to recognize spacenoid independence, and to that end, the largest representative of Spacenoids would be Zeon, with Char being the Newtype leader and Minerva Zabi asserting legitimacy of Zeon, this would mean that Zeon's legitimacy and power will be secured through the Earth sphere, uniting all of the factionalized Zeon remnants.

At least, that's my theory.