Pursuant to the final judgment of the Bucharest Court of Appeal on Wednesday, the red-white-green flags must be removed from the mayor's office, the council chamber and all places where they are displayed in the Székelyudvarhely town hall. According to the ruling, only the Hungarian symbols must be removed, the Polish and Slovak flags can remain.
The removal of the flags was initiated by the Civil Association for Dignity in Europe (ADEC), which acts on behalf of the Romanians of Székelyföld, and which actually litigates against the use of Hungarian symbols and language.
Last June, the Bucharest Court of First Instance considered the flags to be symbols of Hungary and ordered their removal. The district court acting at the second instance considered the appeal of mayor Árpád Gálfi to be unfounded and upheld the first-instance verdict. In addition, he also ordered that the mayor pay 4,000 lei (300,000 forints) in attorney's fees to the plaintiff.
In the current trial, the mayor's representatives argued that the red-white-green flags were received from Székelyudvarhely's sister towns in Hungary, and were erected as a sign of respect together with the flags received from sister towns in Poland and Slovakia. According to the court ruling, only the Hungarian symbols must be removed.
In 2019, ADEC had both the Székely flag and the city flag removed from the facade of the Székelyudvarhely town hall through litigation, and also complained to the mayor's office because the name of the event appeared only in Hungarian on the Székelyudvarhely Days poster. However, the latter's claim was rejected by both the Romanian National Anti-Discrimination Council (CNCD) and the court.
Since 2018, the mayor of Székelyudvarhely has also been fined by the prefect of Hargita County every year for the Hungarian flags displayed in the city on March 15.
MTI
