PA to announce coalition soon
Palestinian President Abbas’ spokesperson expresses optimism following intense meetings between Abbas and Prime Minister Haniyeh, assesses unity government could be established within 10 days. Palestinians hope new government will ease economic crisis
Fatah and Hamas efforts to establish a coalition government in the Palestinian Authority had achieved significant advances, Palestinian officials said Saturday afternoon.
At the conclusion of a Saturday meeting between Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh and President Mahmoud Abbas – the fifth such meeting in the past 48 hours – Abbas’ spokesperson Nabil Abu Rdeneh said the two leaders had made significant progress and a unity government was expected within ten days.
Abu Rdeneh told reporters that the meetings were aimed at reaching an agreement on the minimum basic principles for establishing a joint government.
The PA’s financial crisis and failure to pay wages led workers to launch a large-scale strike Saturday, which kept schools closed for the first day of the school year.
The disagreement between Abbas and Haniyeh centered on the phrasings of the unity government’s basic plan. Both sides estimated that in the end an agreement would be reached necessitating a political government rather than a professional government.
Another point of variance was over the prime ministerial position in the coalition. Hamas demanded that one of their leaders would stand at the head of the government as the party holds nearly two-thirds of parliamentary seats, but Fatah resisted the demand. One possibility discussed was rotating the position between a Fatah and a Hamas representative. In the upcoming days, meetings between the factions will center on this issue along with the phrasing of a number of political clauses.
A senior Palestinian source told Ynet that according to his assessment, a unity government would be in full operation by the beginning of the month of Ramadan in three weeks.
Economic crisis
On Saturday Fatah accused Hamas of being solely responsibly for the economic isolation of the PA, saying it was Hamas’ position on issues that led the international community to cut off all financial assistance to the Palestinians.
Fatah expressed support for the general strike declared by the various workers unions. Hamas, on the other hand, called the strike illegal and said it was politically motivated, hinting at the fact that Fatah might be encouraging the strike, as most of the striking workers belonged to that party.
Fatah and the unions rejected the accusations and said the strike was purely economically motivated and was based on the workers’ demands to receive their wages, which have been withheld for nearly seven months.
The strike was expected to continue through the next few days. Sources assessed however that the establishment of a unity government and paying advances to the clerks, along with the EU’s notification that they would soon transfer funds to the PA, could end the strike sooner.
Palestinian Liberation Organization executive committee member Yasser Abed Rabbo said the strike was the beginning of a mending process via which the Palestinian people had decided to protest its government’s policies. Hamas slammed Abed Rabbo saying he was appointed by a foreign agenda, and said internal political officials were part of an international plot to topple the government.
