Campaign Continues

Green Party State Councilor Urges People to Call Him—in Song

“Hi, it’s Stefan again”—Kaineder in the recording studio recording the jingle.(Bild: Grüne OÖ)

A state councilor who publishes his personal cell phone number and urges the public to call him: This unusual campaign by Stefan Kaineder ran for three weeks in May. Now the Green Party leader is once again asking people to call—this time in the form of a jingle he sang himself, which can be heard online and on the radio.

“Hello, it’s Stefan again”: That’s how a short song begins, which has been available online since Monday and will also be played on private radio stations in Upper Austria for two weeks. The performer: Provincial Environment Minister Stefan Kaineder. Whether the schlager-style jingle has what it takes to be a late-summer hit is questionable—but that’s not the point. Rather, the song marks the continuation of the “Da Stefan—da für dich” campaign.

Already more than 1,000 phone calls
During the three weeks the campaign was promoted in May, the Green Party leader received more than 600 calls, according to his own account. After that, the calls slowed down, but never stopped entirely: “One to three people still call every day,” says Kaineder—he has now taken more than 1,000 calls as part of the campaign. And now he wants to ramp them up again.

To that end, the state councilor—who used to be a member of various rock bands himself—is now urging the public to call by singing. “The song can be surprising; it can even be polarizing,” he says. “Ideally, people will be able to sing along to my number.”

“Otherwise, we’ll end up with nothing but a conservative governor”
In his many phone calls, he has found that many people are frustrated, in part because they feel that politicians aren’t listening to them. “This out-of-touch ‘bureaucratic democracy’ no longer works for these people.” Politics must “listen, ask questions, and understand what really matters to people,” he explains, justifying the continuation of the campaign. Because if frustration gets the upper hand, “in the end, all that’s left is a Blue governor in Upper Austria.”