To coincide with the 90th birthday of South African former president and anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela, Bulgarian President Georgi Purvanov has announced that the country is to confer on Mandela Bulgaria’s highest civilian order, the Stara Planina Class 1.

In a statement, Purvanov’s office sent traditional birthday greetings to Mandela, and announced that the order was to be conferred on him. It is not clear when and where the award will be handed over.

The Johannesburg-based Nelson Mandela Foundation did not respond to requests for clarity.

Mandela was president of South Africa from 1994 for a single term of four years, having led the anti-apartheid African National Congress to victory in the country’s first democratic elections. He was in jail for 27 years after being convicted of attempting to overthrow the then apartheid state in South Africa.

Trivia: South Africa’s and Bulgaria’s national heroes share a birthday – Vassil Levski, Bulgaria’s “Apostle of Freedom” against Ottoman rule, was born on July 18 1873, forty-five years before the birth of Mandela.