'Livni won't form government'
With her campaign headquarters confident of landslide win, aides to foreign affairs minister doubt she will decide to form new government if elected chairman of Kadima. 'The atmosphere in the political arena won't allow that, elections are in the air'
With less than a month left ahead of the Kadima primary elections, staffers at the campaign headquarters for leading candidate Tzipi Livni are already strategizing for the morning after.
Fully confident of a Livni landslide, senior campaign officials for the foreign affairs minister said on Friday that while the candidate herself has yet to decide on a course of action if she should win, the likelihood of a general election in the early months of 2009 was "very high."
Despite recent public rhetoric by Livni, in which she pledged to work towards forming a new government if elected, aides close to her have said she may be leaning towards a different course of action.
"'The atmosphere in the political arena won't allow the formation of a new government, there's a smell of elections in the air," said the aides.
The contradictory approaches being projected by the Livni camp may be intended to flummox Kadima voters. Those who are interested in a new government will vote for Livni because she has publically embraced the idea, while on the other hand – those keen on seeing a general election will vote for her because polling figures predict a Kadima with Livni at the helm would win more mandates than one with Shaul Mofaz.
Livni's aides said the foreign minister would not grant Shas the children's stipends it is demanding for the 2009 budget, a move which would likely prompt the ultra-Orthodox party to vote against the proposed annual budget.
And as for Labor? "(Defense Minister) Barak will want to stay in the government," Livni's staff asserted, but sounded skeptical regarding the Labor chairman's clout within his own party, adding that he may fail
to secure the votes of his MKs for the budget.
Barak, who has been taking a considerable beating in the polls, has recently said he is in favor of forming a national emergency government.
But some in the political arena doubt the probability of a general election. Once Kadima elects a new chairman, they say, "everything will change, and the dynamics will lead to the formation of a new government. When politicians face two options like these – elections or staying in government for another two years – they opt for what is easier."
