In the heart of Switzerland – is where the left is still a dirty word

A monastery of women was tattooed on the inner thigh of a seashell, says the schnitzel-benchers in the monk costume on the stage. Keep your ear tuned, the smell of the sea. 210 people laugh, loudly and shamelessly.

Among them is Joerg Meyer of the SP. He's on the campaign trail to the people. Is easy for him, he says. It's Sunday morning, 10 o'clock, and Old carnival at the Hotel Seeburg in Luzern, wonderful view of the lake, wonderful room, wonderful mood, Meyer is a stroll to the Breakfast buffet. The carnival is officially over, here it is celebrated but once again – without alcohol, with orange juice and salmon.

The Old carnival is not a place where one would expect a socialist. Meyer is still there. Or just because of that. "I'm not a Saturday morning-Latte-macchiato-type," says the 50-Year-old. He didn't want to say the cliché-Left. And: selectable for Conservative. The organizers of the event have one goal: city and country together, talk to each other and laugh. Perfect for Meyer. He wants to on 31. March, member of the cantonal government. As A SPler. In Lucerne. In the Central part of Switzerland.

For Democrats, there is hardly anything more Difficult. Only in the Uri, the Left was able to defend the seat of government. Everywhere else they flew out: in Schwyz 2012. In Lucerne, 2015 (one representative) had since 1959. Last in train five months ago, where for the first time since 1923, not a Linker was chosen. In the heart of Switzerland, which has always been a citizen influenced, locks the Left. While the cities are always the left and the green is the heart of Switzerland, always civil.

Meyer knows that. "A hard place", announced the Parliament of the Canton Region, "we are making Opposition with a lot of headwind." On the ideas of the SP is not dealt with in Lucerne, mostly in the first place. Meyer wants to change that and has written to all SP-local councillors of Switzerland and a paying-in slip enclosed. "It was a nice amount of came together." Four-digit number. Meyer may need the money, his Budget is smaller than that of the bourgeois candidates. So he laughs less posters and more on the streets in the villages.

The day before, he was at 8 in the morning to Ruswil on the horse market. At 11 p.m. in front of the shopping center in Hitzkirch. At 13 o'clock in Kriens, in the afternoon in Lucerne, then he was on the phone for two hours with Luzernern and Lucerne, together with 70 other social Democrats. And in the evening: visit to the Swiss film prize. Meyer goes to sleep after such days.

from Zurich, in the Uri

Rebekka Wyler is sitting in the train. Of first box, it goes via Luzern to Bern. Passing the lake of Lucerne and lake of Zug, through Schwyzerbiet and Zug country, 2 hours and 26 minutes long, by the social-democratic wasteland. Wyler is the Co-General Secretary of the SP Switzerland, member of the municipal Council in the first field, and in a relationship with the single SP-governing Council of Central Switzerland. Because of him, Wyler moved three years ago from Zurich after the first field to the URI. Earlier, jet black, today, still dominated by conservative Thinking. Trade unions there were in the Central part of Switzerland is hardly in the interests of the working class has formerly perceived of the Christian social wing of the CVP. Only Exception: Uri. Here are the SP Iron "railway" and stuff häusler took.

"The social Democrat, it has back here more difficult," says Wyler. There is little professional structures, a lot happens on a voluntary basis. If everything is small, it is the policy of the personal. Also, Wyler went to the carnival and boggy in the first fields in the parish centre. Socializing is a Must for politicians in the country for almost a. The social Democrats are less sociable? Wyler hesitate. "That would be the easy conclusion, but I believe that the SP-Deep in the heart of Switzerland, other reasons," she says. The lack of Union tradition. In addition, the low-tax policy, especially opponents of social democracy have lured in the heart of Switzerland.

"of the"left" is in Central Switzerland and often a dirty word."Andy Tschümperlin, former SP national councillor from Schwyz

And there is the SVP. "Your advent has changed the climate," says Wyler. Before the CVP and the FDP, the concordance, they followed a voluntary proportional system and tried all of the political forces. The FDP, for example, had the potential for three seats, she abandoned it, and sent only two candidates for the election in order for a SP also finds place in the government. With the rise of the SVP, this solidarity evaporated somewhere between vanity and party think. Not necessarily because of the SVP, but rather because the other parties CVP and FDP did not want to lose even more seats. The result is that the SP lost its place in the Executive branch.

"The tone has changed with the SVP also, the language was coarser," says Wyler. You hear sometimes on the road a spell, but that was nothing in comparison with what to tell her Comrades from the Canton of Schwyz.

threats of murder in Schwyz

For example, Andy Tschümperlin, eleven years in the cantonal Parliament, eight years in the national Council, four of them voted out of office as group President, 2015. The has met him – so strong that he wondered at the time, from the Canton to pull away. Away from it all. To present all the insults of the past years were suddenly back.

He got death threats. The children have heard in school, from colleagues, what a dork of a father. Walks in SVP-communities like Unteriberg for Tschümperlin "never loose", translated means: very tedious. He has noticed a disgrace to the road first-Hand, the member of the Parliament described him once as a traitor. ""The left" is often a dirty word," says Tschümperlin. "In some places, there is an incredible hatred to social-democratic ideas."

These hardening tendencies of the Lucerne Jörg Meyer knows less. But he, too, suffers from the reputation of his party. In the city, he has an audience – in the country. Meyer lives in Adligenswil, a Agglo-community. He works in Lucerne-the city. In the interview, Meyer weaves his rural roots and his middle-class parents. The Randomness has a pattern. Meyer knows that he will get many votes in the city, the need to win election but out in the country. There, he must be selectable. Meyer stands behind the concordance and want to loose about the seat of the Party Marcel Schwerzmann. He needs the favor of the Bourgeois.

The SP in Lucerne

Meyer is one advantage: The Momentum is on his side. Lucerne tried in the past few years as a low-tax Canton – and failed. Instead, more money flowed into the Canton Treasury, it was less.

The Bourgeois wanted to correct and fix the damage. Almost desperate, she imposed a forced holiday in the schools, closing of post on Saturdays, the police and reduced premium subsidies. "Everything ugly stories," said Meyer, with a SP as a corrective of the government, this would hardly be happening, he says. His party benefited at all. In the last four years, the SP had, according to Meyer, a membership increase of 40 percent – with no other SP-cantonal party grows stronger. "Lucerne needs more resources," he says. Means that up with the taxes. Economic policy is more than just tax policy. Meyer speaks in short, clear Statements. His line could work in a Canton, the lives of the high Finance and large corporations, but SMEs, the commercial and innovative young companies.

Meyer will be greeted at the Old carnival in the Hotel Seeburg. Bye, machs guet, to spöter, gäu. A Lucerne's father tells him how bad he thinks it is that the self-care contribution for parents was cut in half. The issue in Meyers political map. He listens, nods and says goodbye a little later, to listen to the scavenger banks. It's just the senior civil servants are satirized – and-egg, what is there to desire more than the mockery of the powers that be. The government councils give in to the laughter that applies here as Ehrbekundung. So the senior civil servants read to each other in the first meeting after the carnival, the scavenger banks, in which they themselves occur.

Jörg Meyer wants to be a part of it. Also because he knows that the Lucerne laugh particularly fond of the SP.

(Tages-Anzeiger)

Created: 14.03.2019, 10:33 PM