Almogi Says No to Cabinet Post

Premier Yitzhak Rabin is still searching for a suitable candidate to fill the Cabinet vacancy created by the resignation of Information Minister Aharon Yariv last week. Yosef Almogi, the Mayor of Haifa, who was offered a Cabinet post by Rabin, rejected it Friday on grounds that it would conflict with his mayoral duties.

Almogi, a leader of the Labor Party’s Mapai faction, had been expected to accept Rabin’s invitation to serve as a minister-without-portfolio which would have allowed him to devote most of his time to Haifa’s municipal affairs. However, he told the Premier during a visit to Haifa that he felt he could not serve in the government and at the same time exercise his obligations to the citizens of Haifa. Rabin announced Almogi’s decision to reporters Friday.

That decision was said to have been influenced by Justice Minister Haim Zadok’s view that it was poor administrative practice for a Cabinet officer to hold a local elective office. Almogi had been Minister of Labor in the government of former Premier Golda Meir. He resigned last year to run for Mayor of Haifa.

Meanwhile, the Mapai leadership is reportedly pressuring Rabin to name former Foreign Minister Abba Eban to the vacant Cabinet seat, Rabin, whose cool relations with Eban precipitated the latter’s resignation from the government, has so far refused. It appears certain, however, that Rabin will abolish the Information Ministry, created less than a year ago. He is said to agree with the view expressed in Yariv’s letter of resignation that there was no need for an Information Ministry and that its functions could be better exercised by a department of government attached to the Prime Minister’s Office.