At least three candidates will vie for the first place on the Likud-Liberal Party Knesset list when the party’s 264-member Central Committee convenes April 26 to pick the Knesset slate.
Justice Minister Moshe Nissim, Energy Minister Yitzhak Modai and Knesset Speaker Menachem Savidor have announced their candidacies, and there may yet be others who will throw their hats into the ring before April 26.
Political pundits feel the odds were fairly even so long as it looked like a straight fight between Modai and Nissim. But with Savidor announcing his candidacy yesterday — the calculations have become more complex. Savidor is unlikely to emerge as winner. But he could be a spoiler, harming the chances of one or more of the front-runners by diverting support for himself.
Modai and Nissim head rival factions within the much-factionalized Liberal Party. Commerce Minister Gideon Patt and Tourism Minister Avraham Sharir also head factions, but neither has yet announced a bid for the leadership.
Once a leader is elected — and if the party succeeds in uniting behind him — the leader would fill the No. 2 slot in the Likud Knesset list, and would have a strong claim to a Deputy Premiership if Likud forms the next government. This was the late Simcha Ehrlich’s position in the list both in 1977 and in 1981. Ehrlich, a long-time Liberal leader, died last year and since then there has been no acknowledge head of the party.
There has been muttering within Herut against the Liberals’ large number of assured seats on the Likud list. Herut activists — especially those who feel deprived of a chance to win a Knesset seat — contend that Herut brings in the votes and that the Liberals, were they to run alone, would achieve nowhere near the 18 seats they have out of Likud’s present 46.
Premier Yitzhak Shamir is unlikely, however, to upset the Likud-Liberal balance agreed upon by Menachem Begin and Ehrlich almost 20 years ago when they formed their Likud (then called Gahal) bloc that went on to wrest power from Labor in the 1977 elections.
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