MK Miki Zohar (Likud) has presented to law proposals to the Knesset today for voting. One law is to shorten the amount of time required from the time elections are called until the date elections are actually held. The current law says elections will be held 90 days from the date elections were officially ordered.
Miki Zohar says considering the current circumstances with two elections having passed and still no government is functioning, we need to lessen the amount of time it takes to get a government back up and functioning. Zohar has proposed that elections be held in just 45 days from when elections are called, cutting the campaigning time in half.
I think he could cut it down even more. Most campaigning is done in the last two weeks before the elections anyway. In addition, he should propose cutting down the amount of time given the different nominees to try to form a government. Time and again we see them just wasting a lot of time and playing hard to get and only talking serious in crunch time, in the last few days.
The second proposal Zohar is submitting is to cancel the national holiday status of election day.
Zohar says this is too damaging to the economy, especially when we have had two, and possibly three, elections in one year, and has not been proven to push up the voting percentages.
In actuality, Zohar probably is basing this on the historically higher turnout among Right voters and lower among Left and turning it into a regular workday will discourage people from voting (they will be busy, at work, etc) and the Left might be hurt (in his assumption) more than the Right, giving the right an advantage.
I like the national vacation day. It would be a shame to lose it. Israel has a pretty high voter turnout, so maybe the vacation day does help. Another option would be Liebermans proposal to require citizens to vote, though I am not sure how that works and what happens if someone does not vote and how enforceable this is.
The golden rule is that if a politician wants to make changes to the electoral system, it is somehow only meant to benefit him and his party. Whether my guess/assumption is right or wrong, I am sure Zohar is asking these proposals because he thinks it will help him and the Likud
------------------------------------------------------
Reach thousands of readers with your ad by advertising on Life in Israel
------------------------------------------------------
