Hotovely: PM risks turning Likud into dictatorship
03/14/2013 02:47
In interview with 'Post,' MK Hotovely calls for PM to listen to Likud voters and let the party’s younger generation become ministers.
Likud MK Tzipi Hotovely Photo: Marc Israel Sellem
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu must take the results of the Likud’s
democratic primary into consideration when forming a coalition, MK Tzipi
Hotovely (Likud Beytenu) said in an exclusive interview with The Jerusalem Post
Wednesday.
“The prime minister wants to respect veterans in the party and
feels he can’t tell a minister that now he’ll be a regular MK. It’s a twisted
method that could turn into a dictatorship,” Hotovely explained, following
indications that Netanyahu will not appoint any new ministers.
Hotovely
unseated outgoing Culture and Sport Minister Limor Livnat as the “first lady of
the Likud” in the party’s November primary, reaching the 10th spot in the Likud
and the 15th in the combined Likud Beytenu list.
“There was a primary,
and part of the idea of a primary is to show who Likud voters want to see in the
next government,” she said. “There was a clear choice to change generations and
refresh our ranks.”
Though she called former Likud MKs like Bennie Begin
and Dan Meridor “wonderful people,” Hotovely said it is a natural process for
party veterans to be voted out over time.
“The prime minister has to
allow for political renewal.
There is nothing more democratic than
respecting the results of the primary,” she added. “At the moment, with the
number of seats in the Knesset we have [31], there is not much room for
maneuvering, but the choice to go to old politics hurts the Likud’s public
image.”
Still, Hotovely denied that Netanyahu may feel threatened by
younger, more rightwing MKs in the party, pointing out that he personally
recruited her into the Likud in 2009.
Since at the time of the interview
Hotovely still didn’t know what her position would be, she said she was not
disappointed and expected to be a minister.
At the same time, the Likud
MK admitted that senior party sources told her that she will most likely be made
a deputy minister.
“I only want a meaningful job in a significant
ministry,” Hotovely stated, adding that the two topics that most interest her
are foreign policy, especially in public diplomacy and Diaspora affairs, and
Jewish identity in education.
The full interview – in which she addresses
settlers’ influence on the Likud, shares her thoughts on Bayit Yehudi leader
Naftali Bennett and Yesh Atid chairman Yair Lapid, and discusses preparations
for her wedding and family life – will be published in The Jerusalem Post’s
Hebrew-language sister newspaper Sof Hashavua on Friday.