Andrew McCathie -
Germany had planned to unveil next month a new 17-million-euro ($20-million) monument marking the nation’s reunification three decades ago. But a series of setbacks have delayed the launch of the Monument to Freedom and Unity, with construction now not expected to be finished possibly until the end of the year.
The German parliament agreed to the monument in 2007 with plans to begin the building work in 2013 on a site next to the rebuilt imperial Berlin Palace, which is also due to open later this year. The original plan was to unveil the monument in the German capital’s historic heart as part of celebrations next month marking the country’s 30th birthday. But the 50-metre-long interactive monument, which has been dubbed the unification seesaw because of its curved bowl-like shape, has been dogged by string of preservation orders, environmental and financing problems as well as the construction work under way on other nearby projects. This also resulted in scraping plans to unveil the monument during last year’s 30th anniversary of the breaching of the Berlin Wall. It is designed by the German architectural group Milla & Partner in collaboration with the Berlin choreographer Sasha Waltz. The monument will gently move as groups of people walk across its large seesaw-like platform.
“The memorial honours the courageous citizens who in 1989 made possible through a peaceful revolution the fall of the Wall and the reunification of Germany” the Milla group said setting out its plans for the monument.
More recently, the monument has faced new concerns. Once completed, the structure is to bear the inscription: “Wir sinddas Volk, Wir sind ein Volk” (We are the People, We are One People”) which was the rallying cry in 1989 of those in the nation’s former east seeking an end to the region’s communist state. But the slogan has also now been co-opted by far-right groups seeking to promote their agenda in Germany.
The Milla group’s plan emerged as the winner but only after the authorities were forced to mount two competitions for the design of the project after the jury set up for the first competition failed to reach a majority decision on any of the entries.
Four years ago, the federal parliament’s budget committee called for the project’s construction to be halted in part because of the increased costs resulting from the resettlement of a colony of bats living in the area where the monument was to be sited.
The delays in building the project also opened up a fresh debate about whether erecting the monument next to the city palace was the correct location and whether another site would be more appropriate such as near the nation’s parliament building, the Reichstag, 3.5 km away. However, the building work was finally launched in May this year after the project secured the renewed backing of the parliament. — dpa
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