An example to the big boys (and girls)
It’s probably a bit late for candidates to start thinking about campaign videos, but we were really struck by one we found on Irish Election from Lech Szczecinski, an Independent running for Dublin City council in the South-West Inner City ward.
Using a simple yet engaging concept, it is an example to all campaigners on limited budgets. And those swimming in cash too. Lech admits he cannot doorstep 16,000 voters, so this is shot from the doorsteppees point of view.
He comes across as personable, intelligent, likeable and trustworthy. We don’t know anything about his former life in Poland, but he reminds us of a geography teacher we had in school who managed to make karst, moraines and oxbow lakes sound like the most fascinating things on earth.
The iffy Eurotrance soundtrack spoils it a bit, and Lech gets a tad carried away with the cheesy graphics at the end, but you can’t have everything.
Lech makes the point that some 10 per cent of Ireland’s residents are non-nationals. As Ruadhán Mac Cormaic writes in The Irish Times today, immigrants are beginning to make their political mark on the Irish landscape. He notes that this year, more than 40 foreign candidates from some 13 countries in Europe, Africa, Asia and the US are standing, 30 of whom were selected by the main parties (only Sinn Féin has none).
So, do you think immigrant voters could upset long-standing voting patterns? And have the main political parties done enough to address their concerns and tap into this demographic?
(Whoops, sorry, wrong photo. This is the real one below. It’s an official publicity shot for the Louth Green Party’s election team posing in Drumcar Woods. And very nice they look too.)
