Szekler flag
Although the blue and gold flag with a sun star and crescent moon, which has become the symbol of the Szekler autonomist movement, is a brand new creation, it is still reminiscent of the heroic era of nationalism, when a national symbol could mobilise masses of people for an idea. The “Szekler flag” was adopted by the Szekler National Council (SZNT), an organisation fighting for the territorial autonomy of Szeklerland (Harghita and Covasna, plus part of Mureș County) in early 2004. It was created by Ádám Kónya, the vice-president of the SZNT and a historian and museologist from Sfântu Gheorghe, using traditional Szekler symbols and elements of historical flags from Transylvania. The use of the “Szekler flag” was initially slow to spread – not only did the red and black colours of another Szekler region compete with it, but the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania also saw the SZNT as its political rival. In 2009, the Assembly of Szekler Local Governments declared the flag one of the symbols of Szeklerland, and urged as many local governments as possible to use it, taking advantage of the unclear legal regulation. However, the dissemination of the symbol met with resistance from the Romanian state authorities: the prefectures and Romanian nationalists launched several lawsuits against the “official” use of the flag. The “flag war” that lasted for years not only raised the symbolic conflict to an inter-state level – one of the results is a large “Szekler flag” on the facade of the Parliament building in Budapest since 2013 – but also contributed to its wide acceptance beyond the region, and gradually made it a symbol of Hungarian national solidarity. The lawsuits were finally settled by a law passed in 2015, which made it virtually impossible for the “Szekler flag” to become the official symbol of the region. Since then, the flag has been relegated to churchyards and private homes, as well as for use at private or occasional public events.