The amount of political billboards along the street has been steadily increasing ahead of an early return to the polls on August 19. The last election was held just recently in January of this year, making campaigning a greater challenge than usual.
Raising funds and getting financial contributions twice in seven months is obviously harder. In addition, existing parties may have already discarded materials displayed back then, while those left could often not be reused because of changes in the candidate list since that time.
Nevertheless, considerable effort is being made by the politicians to be seen by people in traffic. How effective this approach is remains unclear, but “the bigger the sign the more the votes,” seems to be one of the prevalent beliefs.
Apart from campaign posters that must – thankfully – be removed soon after the election, the number of commercial signs is notably going up. This has raised concerns among readers whether authorities issued permits for all of these and, if so, based on what criteria.
Take the billboards outside the airport, do these fall under the authority of Princess Juliana International Airport (PJIA) or government? After all, they were erected along the public road.
Doubts are consequently being expressed regarding applicable legislation and enforcement, let alone active controls. A business needs a proper directional sign, but it regards billboards purely for advertising purposes in totally different locations that some consider an eyesore.
It begs the question: How many are too much?
