Yair Lapid officially registered his new political party, Yesh Atid (“There is a
Future”), on Sunday.
Two weeks after the party’s original name, Atid
(“Future”), was rejected because an inactive Atid party exists, Lapid announced
that registering the party is another step towards his goal of “gaining major
and significant political power.”
Lapid, a former Channel 2 journalist,
wrote in a letter to his supporters that his party will change the order of
priorities and truly represent the middle class.
“We established ‘Yesh
Atid’ because the Israeli middle class, the class that works and is productive,
pays taxes and serves in the army, does not have a voice and no one protects its
interests in the matters close to its heart: education, health, transportation,
housing, fighting corruption and the cost of living,” Lapid wrote.
He
repeated his campaign slogan “Where is the money?” and added that the money
exists, but the wrong people spend it on the wrong things.
“The time has
come to change this,” Lapid wrote.
A recent poll by Smith Research,
sponsored by The Jerusalem Post, showed that Lapid would get 11 Knesset seats,
about a third of what Likud, which is leading with 31, is expected to
get.
Lapid has vowed that his party will join the next government, and
expressed interest in serving as education minister, despite never finishing
high school.