New seven world wonders contest is not scientific: UNESCO

July 06: “The way of selecting ‘new seven wonder’ is not scientific and there is no relationship of this contest to UN world heritage Sites”, UNESCO said on its website. “It is not sufficient to recognise the emotional value of certain sites, but they have to be evaluated with scientific criteria and protected with legal measures”. The result of the “New Seven Wonders Contest” is going to be declared tomorrow at Madrid's Santiago Bernabeu football stadium in Lisbon.

According to experts and observers, “Voting is often based on nationalism rather than objective criteria, and there is no control to prevent the same people from voting many times to put their favorite monuments on the top”. The way of selecting the top seven wonder is absolutely unfair. It is not more than earning name, fame and money, blamed some people to the founder of the contest as there is a different rate of charges deducted for voting through phone and sms.

On the contrary, “The half of the funding would be used for restoring the missed monuments such as Buddha statue of Bamiyan that was destroyed by the Afghanis in 2001.”, replied Weber, the founder member of the project in the response of the blame imposed on the foundation. “Our most of the funding are collecting through sponsorship, media rights and marketing schemes, not only for voting.” added Weber to prove the way of selection is not wrong.

But on the contrary, according to Francisco Calvo Serraller, the Spanish art historian “You cannot measure artistic quality with a popular vote. If the popularity is the right way of selection, then Madrid’s Santiago Bernabeu football stadium must also be included in this list”. As it is known the final results will be declared tomorrow in this ground.

The controversy is not ended here; it attached it with the beginning of this campaign. Earlier they forget to add “The wall of China” in this list while Egypt protested the list as pyramids do not come under the new wonders. These have been the part of old seven wonders. No matter these are still in existence and all the old wonders has been collapsed. That’s why the founders of this campaign have to provide a separate place to ‘Pyramids of Giza’. It is now in a special section.

A panel of experts headed by Federico Mayor Zaragoza, former director of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), finally selected 20 wonders from among 77 initial lists. According to compiled list the 20 wonders are: ‘Acropolis’ at Athens in Greece, ‘Alhambra’ at Granada in Spain, ‘Angkor’ at Cambodia, ‘The pyramid of Chichen Itza’ at Mexico, Christ Reedemer at Rio de Janeiero in Brazil, ‘Colosseum’ at Rome in Italy, EasterIsland Statues in Chile, ‘Eiffel Tower’ at Paris in France, ‘Great wall of China’, ‘Hagia Sophia’ at Istambul in Turkey, ‘Kiyomizu Temple at Kyoto in Japan, ‘Kremlin/St. Basil’ at Moscow in Russia, ‘Machu Pichu’ in Peru, ‘Neuschwanstein Castle’ at Schwangau in Germany, ‘Petra’ in Jordon, ‘Statue of Liberty’ at New York in USA, ‘Stonhenge’ at Amesbury in UK, ‘Sydney Opera House’ in Australia, ‘Taj Mahal’ at Agra in India and ‘Timbuktu’ in Mali.

More than 70 millions of the voting has been done through various ways according to Weber. A Certificate is also provided as a reward for additional single voting in just $2. Beside these controversies, a new history will be written in Real Madrid’s Stadium.