Government of Romania: Recognize the Autonomy of Székely Land!

Quiet Ethnic Cleansing – Redistricting

Székely Land (also called Szekler Land in English) is a historical region at the southeastern part of Transylvania, thus locates roughly in the center of today’s Romania. The 70-80 % of its population are the Hungarian speaking Székelys (in some towns 97%) and they have an absolutely different culture than the rest of the country. In everyday life they use a dialect of Hungarian language which is not even accepted as an official language as only Romanian is the official language in the whole territory of Romania. Székelys would like to achieve autonomy and self-governance inside Romania. Just the same as South Tyrol and Sicily (in Italy), Vojvodina (in Serbia) and all the Spanish communities in Spain have now.

Today the area of Székely Land belongs to three different Romanian counties: almost the whole area of Harghita and Covasna counties and a bit less than the half of Mures county. (there are little parts of Székely Land in other counties too, see figure above) Between 1952 – 1968 this region existed under the name Magyar Autonomous Region, then in 1968 they established counties in Romania, so this region had been divided to the above mentioned 2 and a half counties.

Since 2003, Szekler National Council (SZNT) exists which aims to obtain the Autonomy of Székely Land (uniting the Székely areas of these 3 different counties) of which primary official language would be Hungarian and the secondary Romanian. There are also plans for administrative divisions of 8 provinces (see figure above). A Székely flag is also available (today it is not official of course, but widely used in Székely Land and also used by the Szekler National Council). They also have an Anthem (Székely Himnusz), written and composed in 1921. There is also a proposed top-level domain (.sic) and vehicle registration code (SIC), which is used today unofficially as vignette. Marosvásárhely (Targu Mures) is planned to be the capital city. Székely Land does not plan to separate from Romania (as the Romanian media misinterpret it sometimes), they only want to get autonomy and self-governance inside Romania. Today even the fact that this region exists and existed in the history is denied by the Romanian government, although the huge majority of people living in Székely Land define themselves as Székelys, use the Székely flag, sing the Székely anthem and use the Székely dialect of Hungarian language in their everyday life instead of the official Romanian language.

Autonomy issues have extraordinary importance today as the Romanian government plans to establish regions which do not follow the borders of Székely Land, what more, it will divide it to 3 parts and situate them to 3 different regions in which Székelys are in approximately 30 % minority. We hope that the European principle will prevail in Romania too, according to that EU does not appoint regions but it accepts the existing ones. Szekler National Council organizes a rally (similar to theCatalonian one) on 10th March in Marosvásárhely (Targu Mures) and Budapest. (seefacebook group) This petition aims to be a support of these efforts.

some facts:
exists since: 13th century
population of Székely Land: 750,000-800,000
of that Székelys: 70-80 %
area: ~ 12,000 km^2 ( ~ Montenegro, Qatar, Jamaica, Puerto Rico)
subregion of: Transylvania
names in different languages: Székelyföld (Hungarian), Tinutul Secuiesc (Romanian), Terra Siculorum (Latin), Szekler Land, Székely Land (English),
religions of Székely Land: Catholic (53 %), Reformed (21 %), Orthodox (17 %), Unitarian (6 %)
total population of Székelys: ~ 1 million, of that: 550,000 in Székely Land, 180,000 elsewhere in Transylvania, 185,000 in Hungary, 100,000 elsewhere in the world
capitals of the planned 8 Seats (“szék”) (Romanian names in brackets): Marosvásárhely (Targu Mures), Gyergyószentmiklós (Gheorgheni), Székelyudvarhely (Odorheiu Secuiesc), Csíkszereda (Miercurea Ciuc), Barót (Baraolt), Kézdivásárhely (Targu Secuiesc), Sepsiszentgyörgy (Sfantu Gheorghe), Kovászna (Covasna)