by karsten on Wednesday, February 20, 2008 @ 14:09:45 CET(48 reads until May 1, 2008)

Thirty-six anniversaries have been celebrated in Christiania as a free community. Since the government signed the bill about the normalization of the Christiania area in 2004 the community is struggling for its existence. Threats from the changing governments in all these years have always hung above the heads of the Christianites but the situation never has been this serious.
In spite of public support in favour of Christiania the Minister of Finance had set his clerks to realize their plan of ownership for the area. The official suggested plans were published and sent a shockwave of emotions through the citizens and friends of Christiania.
Negotiations saved the the basic existence for the registered inhabitants this far and a major financial injection by a financing fund is being offered to save the existence of Christiania as a home organization. But

people in the community are skeptical about getting organized this way. The mistrust of the entire political system as well as the fear for contracts and responsibility, is deeply anchored in a majority of Christianias population. Another disturbing fact for some citizens is the division of the area to the administrations of different authorities. Then there is the question about ownership of the buildings that in fact belong to the state of Denmark but have been taken care of by the inhabitants at their own cost. This far an essential rule in Christianian is that no one owns the buildings and everybody pays a monthly amount to the area where he or she is living. Children under the age of eighteen are free of payment. People can ask for a reduction if a social situation for this is visible. Neighbours have veto rights towards eventual new neighbours.
Now the time is rushing forward to the date for an answer from Christiania whether to say yes to found the home organization and keep a certain control over future activities in the Christiania area, or be sold to the highest bid. Furthermore there is the discussion about the local planning with the city of Copenhagen that will be on the agenda in the near future.
On top of the entire project there is still the case for the high court where many of Christiania citizens see the true decision will be found. After all some of the secret notes from Ministry of Justice got out to the public with the statement that it would be expropriation after all these years. This fact has a quite contrary impact to the previous secret note of the government's own lawyers.
Change will happen; there is no doubt about that. But how it will be and who is going to make the requested decisions is still wide open.
Several work groups with different topics have worked out an adjustable Christiania model to ratify this, which has to be accepted by the general common meeting before it can be passed on to the authorities that should accept the document as it is. It is questionable how many persons understand the entire content of this document which most certainly will set some demands to the citizens of Christiania.
The only ones who this far really came to a decision is the government - Christiania is to be normalised. The question for the government is how to do this without breaking the law.
In Christiania the discussions continue between the people. When you listen from the sidelines you will hear about the price for the slow death of liberty.