Dhe Stuttgart Lord Mayor Frank Nopper (CDU) has been in office for a good two years. According to Fritz Kuhn (Greens), the citizens wanted a “mover” in the town hall, someone who made a difference. It took Kuhn three months to find his topic, namely fire protection in the Stuttgart television tower.
In the case of Nopper, who originally came from Stuttgart and remigrated from the provincial town of Backnang to the state capital, it took two years to find a topic: tampon dispensers for trans people in the men’s toilets.
Decision goes back to the Greens
There is no such thing in any German town hall, only in the universities of Stuttgart and Bochum. Nopper posted pictures of the tampon dispensers on Wednesday – not because the socio-politically conservative CDU politician is convinced of it, but because he wanted to distance himself from this innovation after a tabloid wanted to make him politically liable for it.
“Unfortunately, I was outvoted. The debate shows how parts of local politics have moved away from the real concerns and needs of the vast majority of people,” Nopper wrote on Instagram. He earned 800 comments and almost 3000 approving likes for this. “There hasn’t been an issue on the OB channels that we’ve gotten such approval with.”
Most commentators blamed the Greens for the “bullshit”. “The woken people are so lost,” wrote one. The CDU parliamentary group leader Alexander Kotz also complained about “the green madness in the town hall”. In fact, the decision to equip the toilets in the town hall and “all citizens’ offices with organic tampons and sanitary napkins without any ifs or buts” goes back to the Greens.
Debate on previous political record
The CDU municipal parliamentary group agreed in December 2021, because in return they were given more jobs in the municipal prison service. There is nothing in the decision about an explicit upgrade of the men’s toilets with tampon dispensers – it apparently goes back to the commitment of the Equal Opportunities Department in the town hall.
With his post, Nopper also sparked a debate about his previous political record. Left-wing councilor Luigi Pantisano, who is known for radical opinions, accused the mayor of right-wing extremism and recommended that he only tap beer kegs in the future. On Instagram, a certain “Tuessl” wrote about Nopper’s political achievements: “There are so many real and genuine concerns, and you haven’t really addressed any of them yet.”
In fact, the people of Stuttgart have so far got to know their mayor at appointments and above all through social media as a constantly smiling caretaker. Almost all pictures conveyed the best tennis court mood and the comfort of the eighties. Not even many officials in the city hall know what Nopper’s political project for Stuttgart actually is. Twice there were reports from the town hall that caused a stir: The “Stuttgarter Zeitung” reported that the “First Lady”, Gudrun Weichselgartner-Nopper, had a lot of influence in the town hall. And a year ago, many were amazed when Nopper made his social democratic opponent in the election campaign, Martin Körner, chief strategist.
