PHOTO: Reuters. Prime Minister Bejnamin Netanyahu during the vote in the Israeli parliament on May 29, 2019.
Israeli lawmakers voted 74-45 to dissolve parliament early on Thursday after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu failed to form a coalition government before the May 29 deadline. This is the first time in Israel’s history that a Prime Minister-designate has failed to form a coalition.
In the April 9 Israeli general elections, no single party won an outright majority in the Knesset, making coalition government inevitable. Netanyahu’s Likud party secured 35 seats in the 120-seat parliament, there seemed to be enough allies to form a conservative coalition to control a solid 65-55 majority.
The prospective coalition has been thrown into turmoil by former Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman, a Moldovan-born immigrant from the former Soviet Union and head of the ultra-nationalist Yisrael Beitenu party. The party has five seats in the Knesset and has turned on Netanyahu by insisting on a new law mandating that young ultra-Orthodox men be drafted into the military like most other Jewish males, while Netanyahu’s ultra-Orthodox allies demanded that the draft exemptions remain in place. Without the five seats of Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu Party, Netanyahu could not have mustered a majority.
Ultra-Orthodox parties including United Torah Judaism Party (a key Netanyahu ally) consider conscription a taboo, fearing that military service will lead to immersion in secularism. But years of exemptions have generated widespread resentment among the rest of Jewish Israelites.
Six months ago, Lieberman resigned his post as the Minister of Defense stating that Netanyahu was not taking forceful enough military action against Hamas in Gaza, which weakened Netanyahu’s ruling right-wing coalition.
A new vote is scheduled for September 17, and it will be the second general elections in Israel this year.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-israel-politics/israel-faces-second-election-in-months-as-netanyahu-fails-to-form-government-idUSKCN1SZ11E
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-israel-politics-explainer/explainer-the-main-players-in-israels-next-election-the-second-this-year-idUSKCN1SZ2Y4
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-48454514
PHOTO: PA Images via Getty Images/House of Commons. House of Commons Speaker John Bercow.
John Bercow, the Speaker of the House of Commons, has dismissed reports he will step down this summer and warned the next Conservative leader that MPs will be able to block attempts to pursue a no-deal Brexit.
Bercow said that he would not step down this summer, as had been widely expected, arguing it would not be "sensible to vacate the chair" before Brexit had been resolved. He also described the idea of Parliament being “evacuated from the center stage of debate on Brexit” as “simply unimaginable”, adding that “the House will want to have its say.”
Speaker Bercow also stated that “the idea that there is an inevitability of a no-deal Brexit would be quite a wrong suggestion.” While he accepted that it was legally the “default position” that the United Kingdom would leave the European Union on October 31 if Parliament had not approved a deal, he said “there is a difference between a legal default position and what the interplay of political forces in parliament will facilitate. It’s not for me to seek or claim to know what is the will of the people; my job is to stand up for the right of the House of Commons institutionally and the rights of individual MPs to express themselves to try and take policy forward as they see fit.”
His announcement infuriated many Conservative MPs who believe he is biased in favor of Remain supporters.
in a separate speech, Bercow fired an apparent warning shot to the next Conservative leader and prime minister that a majority of MPs would again move to block to stop the UK leaving the EU without a deal, as they did in April.
Theresa May is set to leave Downing Street in July and be replaced by a new Conservative prime minister.
Many frontrunners for the leadership, including former Cabinet ministers Boris Johnson and Dominic Raab, have suggested the UK must leave the EU by October 31, with or without a Withdrawal Agreement.
https://www.businessinsider.com/john-bercow-warns-next-prime-minister-that-mps-will-block-no-deal-2019-5
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/29/world/europe/john-bercow-brexit-uk.html
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-48441344
PHOTO: Avas.mv. Newly elected speaker of the parliament, Mohamed Nasheed
Former President of Maldives from 2008 to 2012 and MP for Macchangolhi Central constituency Mohamed Nasheed has been elected as the Speaker of the 19th Parliament.
During the first sitting of the newly elected parliament held on Tuesday night, Nasheed’s name was nominated as Speaker by MP Mohamed Aslam. Another MP Ahmed Tariq nominated the MP Gasim Ibrahim to the post, who recently headed the 18th Parliament.
In the secret vote that followed, Nasheed received 67 out of 85 votes while Gasim received 17 votes in his favor. One vote was declared as void.
While Nasheed has been elected as the Speaker, he has previously stated that he had no interest in the position. Two members of Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP), Mohamed Aslam and Hassan Afeef were pursuing the position, causing rifts among the party with Nasheed backing Aslam and President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih supporting Afeef as Speaker nominee. However, the two members gave up the opportunity to Nasheed in order to avoid disunity among the party.
For first time in the archipelago's history, Nasheed became the first former president to serve as speaker of the parliament. Speaker Nasheed also spearheaded his MDP’s general election campaign which secured a historic super majority with a staggering 65 seats out of the 87 in parliament.
The Speaker in Maldives also has a role in the Judicial Services Commission that regulates the Supreme Court, and is third in line should the positions of the president and vice-president become vacant.
https://www.citynews1130.com/2019/05/28/maldives-ex-president-elected-parliament-speaker/
https://menafn.com/1098583162/Former-President-Nasheed-will-become-Speaker-of-parliament-to-prevent-party-split
https://avas.mv/en/64757
BY MSEAP Cyber Secretariat (mseap@assembly.go.kr) |
