City council discusses election campaigns

Created: 06/29/2022Updated: 06/29/2022, 18:01

No place for the ÖDP: In the 2021 federal elections, the party did not have the opportunity to put up posters in some places.

The wall on Rosenheimer Strasse, for example, was reserved for the seven major parties.

© archive TP

The Holzkirchner municipal council is expected to discuss the rules according to which parties are allowed to post placards before elections on July 19.

The background is the dissatisfaction of the ÖDP, which saw itself at a disadvantage in the last federal election.

Holzkirchen – Peter Limmer is not only deputy district chairman of the ÖDP – he is also a football fan.

That's why he uses an example from the world of football to make it clear that he feels the rules of election advertising are unfair: "When a first division team meets a second division team, the game always starts 0-0 and not 1-0 for the first division just because they are the stronger ones.”

It's different with billboard advertising before elections.

While German party law provides that all parties should be treated equally when public authorities – such as municipalities – make facilities available to them, there may be differences in the extent of the grant, depending on the importance of the parties.

This is measured in particular by the results of previous parliamentary elections.

Limmer can put up with that, for better or for worse.

Especially since his party always had the opportunity to present itself in Holzkirchen before elections.

But that, he says, changed in the run-up to the federal election in 2021: the seven major parties were allowed to advertise with two posters each on the 14-seater billboard.

A second wall was available to all other parties, on which they were each allowed to put up a poster.

However, only half of the 22 locations in Holzkirchen had two billboards.

Where there was only one, the small parties had no notice board, says Limmer.

"The ÖDP was therefore not present in Fellach and Kleinhartpenning.

That gave the impression that the ÖDP was not even up for election.”

The background to this is that the Holzkirchner ordinance on attacks in public only regulates where and for how long the parties are allowed to put up posters.

It also states that the election notice boards are to be used in a space-saving manner so that all parties have sufficient space available.

In which order and with how many posters the parties may advertise is not the subject of the regulation.

Instead, the municipal administration specifies this with the parliamentary group leaders of the municipal council in a non-public meeting in the run-up to elections, adapted to the current circumstances.

"The leaders of the parliamentary groups have looked at how they can turn the regulation so that they have an advantage," Limmer assumes.

In doing so, the municipality disregarded its own ordinance.

After all, she had to pay attention to space-saving billposting so that there was enough space for everyone.

Mayor Christoph Schmid (CSU) rejects this.

"We have not behaved illegally." The expertise of the municipal supervisory authority in the district office had also been obtained.

Whether illegal or not: Limmer wants to enforce new poster rules with a view to the 2023 state elections.

In the last citizens' meeting, he had therefore made a corresponding application.

As reported, this provides that the order of the posters should be based on the last election in the future.

That would currently be the 2021 federal election – in which the ÖDP did not make it into parliament.

His application also stipulates that each party may put up a maximum of one poster per location.

"Then we'll get to the train."

As reported, the majority of citizens voted in favor of the application, which is why it must now be discussed in the municipal council.

According to Limmer, July 19 is the day.

Schmid confirms that they are aiming for this date.

It is not certain, however, since the statement from the district office is still missing.

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