FDP party opts for early poster campaign

You cannot really miss the many posters depicting the FDP party’s candidates for election to the cantonal government. Is it not rather early? After all, election day is still more than ten weeks away.

The party started putting up the posters of the smiling candidates, Andreas Hostettler of Baar, and Florian Weber of Walchwil, a few weeks ago.

In a written response to questions asked by a journalist of the Zuger Zeitung, Hostettler said this was all part of their campaign. “Normally we start too late with our campaigns,” he wrote, “but recognising that “it is the early bird which catches the worm”, we decided to start now.” He went onto explain that another reason was that, as he and Weber were not that well known, electors would have the chance to get to know them better. At a later stage in the campaign, advertising will appear in the local press and the pair will give interviews at various events, too.

How do the other parties feel about the FDP’s early start to the campaign? Do they feel under any pressure to follow suit?

In a response to this question, Marco Knobel, who is running the electoral campaign for the ALG party, wrote. “This just goes to show whose interests the FDP party is representing, namely those of big business, those with deep pockets who can thereby exert political influence. We in the ALG cannot keep up with that, but our candidate, Andreas Hürlimann, will be seeking out direct contact with the electorate. We will also be putting up posters in the late summer and autumn, but not to the same extent as the FDP party. Knobel went on to say that the ALG had published details of the cost of its campaign on its website, with CHF 115,000 available so far. For his part, Hostettler was not able to provide details of the cost of the FDP party’s campaign as it came from various sources.

As for the SP party, they have funds of CHF 80,000 to spend on the campaign, as its party candidate, Barbara Gysel, explained. She felt that an active electoral campaign was good thing for democracy, mentioning how various political parties had launched various strategies. She said money also played a role, but not a deciding one. “Otherwise the SP would not be the second largest party in the country, bigger than the FDP,” she concluded.

Responding on behalf of the SVP party, often monosyllabically, Daniel Staffelbach, who is heading their campaign, said the early putting-up of posters by the FDP party would not influence their (the SVP’s) strategy, adding that their own strategy would be different. As to funding available to them for the campaign, he replied that this depended on their ability to raise funds.

Speaking on behalf of the GLP party, its candidate, Daniel Stadlin, admitted that the FDP party’s poster campaign could indeed make the general public more aware of their candidates, but the GLP party did not have the funding to do the same so early. “We will be starting with our posters after 20 August, when everyone is back from their summer holidays,” he said, adding how CHF 70,000 had been earmarked for their campaign.

When Jean Luv Mösch, the campaign leader for the CVP party, was asked about the FDP party’s early start to the campaign, he said it was not up to him to comment on other parties’ strategies and declined to comment on his own party’s strategy, too. Neither did he provide any details as to the amount of money earmarked for their campaign.