Former Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion today urged Israel’s dominant Mapai party to adopt as their entire platform for the forthcoming election campaign a proposal to change Israel’s electoral system to a district representation type similar to that of Britain, Elimination of the present proportional representation system where the voters cast their ballots for party lists on a countrywide basis would tend to do away with small party representation in the Knesset, Israel’s Parliament.
Addressing a meeting attended by 500 Mapai leaders, Mr. Ben-Gurion proposed that the new Knesset which would convene after the forthcoming elections, pass a district representation election law and dissolve itself with subsequent elections taking place under the new system. “Only in this way, ” he declared, “could Mapai fulfill its tasks and not by negotiating for any two-party front,” he added, referring to current merger talks between Mapai and Achdut Ha Avodah.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
