A political storm raged following a report last Thursday that
before joining the coalition the Shinui Party demanded NIS
123 million for distribution at its own discretion.
Party Chairman Minister Yosef Lapid recently received control
of these funds and decided to grant NIS 45 million to actors,
clowns, entertainers and theaters, NIS 55 million to
university tuition fee subsidies and NIS 23 million to the
collapsing high-tech industry.
At a press conference, Lapid said during the approval process
for the 2003 state budget cuts, which totaled NIS 9 billion,
he agreed to vote in favor of the cuts in exchange for NIS
123 million to distribute at his discretion, telling
reporters the funds were given to him to after he objected to
budget funding for yeshivas and other Torah institutions.
Education Minister Limor Livnat called Lapid's decision
"historic," noting this sum joins the NIS 28 million Prime
Minister Ariel Sharon pledged for secular culture. Finance
Ministry Budget Commissioner Uri Yogev is delaying the
transfer of this sum saying that this special grant must
first receive Finance Committee approval.
MK Rabbi Avrohom Ravitz termed the deal "political bribery
and a return to the special funding system (yichudiim)
that the Shinui Party fought against in the past."
MK Rabbi Moshe Gafni told Yated Ne'eman, "It is
inconceivable to take from the public coffers funds that were
intended for crisis sectors and grant them openhandedly to
singers and actors. Presumably the Finance Committee will not
approve such a move--totally illegal funding distribution.
Committee members will scrutinize the issue of the grant to
`culture' and will not allow the distribution of funds by a
political party that wants to provide monetary benefit to its
voters in the top tenth [socioeconomically], while neglecting
the weak sectors that are not among Shinui voters."
According to MK Rabbi Gafni, Lapid's claim that the funds
were given to him to counterbalance funds granted to yeshivas
distorts the facts. Yeshivas and Torah institutions received
budget funds to restore what certain individuals made a point
of expunging based on a political aim of religious hatred, he
explained. The Finance Minister, who examined the issue
personally, reached the conclusion the yeshivas were
seriously deprived of funds far beyond the cuts in other
sectors and the Knesset approved the initiative in order to
ameliorate the imbalance. Thus these were not new funds
secretly funneled to the yeshivas.
"We are in the midst of a culture war," MK Gafni told the
press. "Theater directors receive enormous salaries and
budget bonuses while yeshivas suffer from a lack of food and
yeshiva directors receive extremely low salaries that do not
allow them to subsist in a dignified manner."
United Torah Jewry Chairman Rabbi Yaakov Litzman sent letters
to the Attorney General and Knesset Legal Advisor Attorney
Anna Schneider last week demanding the Economic Plan Law be
annulled since the Prime Minister and the Finance Minister,
in violation of the law, failed to divulge the existence of
an agreement to distribute budget funds at their own
discretion. Rabbi Litzman quoted the text of the law
requiring that all coalition agreements, both verbal and
written, be laid out before the Knesset. On the 27th of Iyar
the Finance Minister told the Knesset, in a response to an
inquiry, that except for a change in the plan that the
government promised the Mafdal no obligations were made to
any other party.
Legal affairs commentator Moshe Hanegbi said last week that
this "political maneuver" is illegal and contradicts an
explicit High Court ruling. Hanegbi warned "against the
danger of bringing Israeli democracy to days of darkness."
Twenty years ago the High Court stopped the distribution of
special funds by parties, saying it was immoral and improper
to make allocations dependent on having a lobby in the
government, yet in the present situation were Shinui not in
the government the theaters would not receive special budget
allocations.
Hanegbi stressed that the Government Foundation Law
explicitly states that agreements on fund distribution cannot
be made in order to set up a coalition unless the Knesset is
informed in advance. The Knesset must determine priorities
rather than leaving decisions in the hands of a minister who
agrees to join the government. Lapid must first establish his
credibility to the government and only afterwards to his
voters. Hanegbi expressed concerns the Finance Committee
would approve Lapid's decision since the coalition has a
majority in the committee, therefore Hanegbi proposed a High
Court appeal to halt the move. "The Finance Minister cannot
use budget funds entrusted to him to exempt himself from last-
minute coalition problems," concluded Hanegbi.
