Labor leader says if Livni forms her own party it will only serve to further fragment Center bloc that opposes Netanyahu.
Labor leader Shelly Yacimovich reacted to reports that Tzipi Livni was set to announce the formation of her own party in the coming days, saying Saturday that the former foreign minister should run on the Labor list rather than further fragmenting the political bloc opposing Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.
"Livni is a worthy individual in the political arena - she needs to make her move with me and not divide the Center bloc," Yacimovich stated, speaking at a cultural event in Tel Aviv on Saturday.
"The Labor Party under my leadership is the largest and the leading party in the bloc and anyone that wants to unseat Netanyahu cannot form parties that, on their own, will remain small and compete for votes from the same group of voters," Yacimovich said.
Livni’s list will reportedly be called the “National Responsibility Party,” using the name that Livni suggested for Kadima when it was formed at former prime minister Ariel Sharon’s Negev ranch in November 2005.
The party will attempt to provide the “different kind of politics” Livni envisioned for Kadima before it became enveloped in the same internal corruption that plagued the Likud central committee.
To that end, politicians involved in legal troubles like former prime minister Ehud Olmert and former minister Haim Ramon will not be on the list. Olmert is expected to announce that he will not run in the January 22 election at a press conference on Sunday.
Instead the list will feature Maj.-Gen. (res.) Shlomo Yanai, the respected former chairman of Teva Pharmaceuticals, who built up the company’s annual earnings from $8.4 billion to $22b. in five years. A former OC Southern Command, Yanai’s experience dealing with the Gaza Strip could be a key asset for the party following Operation Pillar of Defense.
The list will also include Israel Space Agency chairman Isaac Ben-Israel, who is also a retired major-general, a professor, and briefly a Kadima MK; sucker tent protest leader Boaz Nol, and former ambassador to France Daniel Shek.
The only MKs Livni intends to take from Kadima are her allies Yoel Hasson, Shlomo Molla, Rachel Adatto, Orit Zuaretz, and Robert Tibayev.
A Channel 2 poll broadcast Thursday night on Nissim Mishal’s television show found that if elections were held now Livni’s new party would win nine seats, taking support away from Kadima, which it predicted would not pass the electoral threshold, Labor, which would win 19 seats and Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid Party, which would win only four seats. According to the poll, Likud Beytenu would win 38 seats if elections were held now with Livni's party included in the mix.
Gil Hoffman contributed to this report
