(Rozhen) In the colors of Bulgaria, the flag overlooks the Rhodope Mountains from the top of a 111 meter mast – a record in the EU. Symbol of national pride for its promoters, it is not unanimous in this poor country.
“It won’t make Bulgarians richer but it will elevate their spirits,” says Simeon Karakolev, the man behind the initiative, brushing aside the critics.
To the cries of “Long live Bulgaria!” “, the spectators enthusiastically welcomed the huge banner just unveiled on the site of Rojen, on the occasion of a folk festival.
Its surface of 1110 square meters refers, like the height of the pylon, to the area of 111,000 km2 of the Balkan state.
Within the European Union, it dethrones a Finnish mast of 100 meters even if elsewhere, Egypt, Saudi Arabia or North Korea have built even more daring structures.
“It is not to everyone’s taste, we are accused of paganism, but this emblem must be respected,” Dimitar Mitev, a 69-year-old former army colonel and “patriot”, told AFP.
Pro-Russian nationalism
Nationalism, often tinged with pro-Russian feelings in this former communist land, thrives in Bulgaria, in unison with disinformation.
Citizens are “abandoned to leaders who measure national pride at the height of a mast” and are “under the yoke of Russian propaganda”, lamented political scientist Ognyan Mintchev on Facebook.
President Roumen Radev, who does not hide his sympathies for the Kremlin, has also taken advantage of the meeting in this high place of Bulgarian traditions to blame Kyiv. “They insist on waging this war for which Europe is paying the bill,” he said on the sidelines of the inauguration.
In the same virulent tone, he stubbornly supported the mega-flag, castigating “the dishonorable attempts at denigration”, while a caricature showing him twirling around the pylon went viral on social networks.
The architect of the project Simeon Karakolev thanked the authorities for “not having yielded to the pressure”, being surprised by the surge of “hatred of the Bulgarian intelligentsia”.
To remarks on the alleged irregularities in the building permit, he replied that “the checks showed that everything was perfectly legal”.
Stop the concrete
The man who runs a foundation whose mission is to “ensure the spiritual heritage of Bulgaria continues” also defends the mode of financing, considered opaque by opponents of the initiative.
In total, 500,000 euros (750,000 Canadian dollars) were collected through a donation campaign. According to the local press, public companies, although in debt, were approached, but the participants preferred to remain anonymous in the face of the controversy.
“Are there not more pressing causes in this country with its dilapidated health system, victim of a massive exodus of its youth? “, was offended the right-wing deputy Ivaylo Mirtchev.
“We don’t need the Bulgarian flag to fly at heights unmatched in the EU,” he tweeted. And to call instead to fight against the evils which make Bulgaria the bad pupil of the Union: illiteracy, domestic violence, the flight of doctors…
Others have denounced an environmental aberration in a natural space that has been preserved until now. “Stop the concrete”: a petition which gathered more than 2000 signatures tried in vain to stop the adventure.
Coming from the neighboring town with her children, Sofia Botoucharova evokes her “discomfort in front of this large pole” of 55 tons “out of the ground in the middle of meadows and forests”.
“A human intervention in nature” that this 38-year-old consultant “does not approve of”.
Lacking a breeze, the flag missed its debut, hanging limply from the mast on D-Day, far from the national splendor touted by its supporters.