Livni replaces Ehud Olmert
2008-09-18 07:39
Tel Aviv - Tzipi Livni was narrowly
elected leader of Israel's ruling party and vowed on Thursday to
start work immediately on forming a new coalition that will let
her succeed the scandal-hit Ehud Olmert as prime minister.
After a tense night of counting following exit polls that
showed the foreign minister cruising to a big win, officials
said the final margin over Shaul Mofaz, a former general who is
now transport minister, was just over one percentage point.
The final result was a relief to Livni, a 50-year-old
lawyer, who had declared victory to supporters hours earlier.
"The good guys won," the one-time Mossad intelligence agent
had told her backers within the centrist Kadima party.
Party spokesperson Shmuel Dahan put the final result at 43.1%
for Livni to 42.0% for Mofaz - a huge swing from
the 10- to 12-point margins shown in exit polls. Two other
candidates trailed well behind.
"On the level of government in Israel, we have to deal with
difficult threats," Livni told reporters outside her Tel Aviv
home at dawn after an anxious night of waiting for the count.
She made no direct mention of the peace negotiations she has
been heading with the Palestinians for the past year.
"The national mission ... is to create stability quickly,"
she said, adding: "There is economic instability."
Facing what are likely to be complicated talks with
potential political partners, Livni said: "Tomorrow, I will
begin meeting with representatives of the factions in order to
form quickly a coalition that can deal with all of these
challenges that lie ahead."
Rifts
Livni also pledged to heal rifts in the party left by the
primary campaign, which ended with the Mofaz camp trying to
challenge the count. The Iranian-born former defence chief,
popular among fellow Jews of Middle Eastern as opposed to
European origin, had yet to make any statement on the result.
Palestinian peace negotiators - and possibly the sponsors
of the peace process in Washington - were among those
applauding as early counts from local offices seemed to confirm
a win for Livni.
But the daughter of storied Zionist guerrilla fighters of
the 1940s will require combative spirit and political flair to
consolidate her goal of becoming Israel's first woman leader
since the redoubtable Golda Meir in the 1970s.
Olmert, who telephoned Livni with congratulations, has said
he will resign as soon as Kadima has a new leader. But the
outgoing premier, who could be indicted for corruption, has also
vowed to exercise his right to stay on in a caretaker capacity
until Livni forges her own, new coalition government.
That process, involving deals with ambitious Labour party
leader Ehud Barak on the left and influential Jewish religious
parties on the right, could take weeks or months.
Many believe there may yet be an early parliamentary election, which polls show Benjamin Netanyahu's right-wing Likud would win.