Teveria Mayor Fails to Pass Budget, Inching Closer to Interior Ministry Intervention

The opposition members of the Teveria municipality once again voted down Mayor Ron Kobi’s budget. On Tuesday, a second budget meeting was held for the 2019 financial year, and this time too, the vote didn’t pass, after nine council members voted against and only six voted in favor.

It should be noted that even councilman Michael Lerer, who recently joined the coalition, voted against the budget. Those who voted for the budget were only the members of Mayor Ron Kobi’s party.

Kobi came to the meeting without high hopes, and it seems that despite the looming deadline to pass the budget, and with it the risk that the Interior Ministry will appoint an appointed committee to run the city, he is not even conducting coalition negotiations.

Opposition leader Rafael Trabelsi tried speaking at the opening of the budget meeting, yet he was interrupted by shouting of supporters of Kobi.

The shouting continued, and the mayor himself asked to get his supporters out of the room, saying, “It’s impossible to go on like this. Everyone is disturbing here. Please allow councilman Raphael Trabelsi speak.”

After the incident, Trabelsi continued, “Ron, I actually feel sorry for you, you cannot even control your supporters, they do not reckon with you. You do not know how to control council meetings, and this is the result of your daily incitement. On the point of the budget, we will not be able to discuss the budget, because even though I held a meeting with the council treasurer and asked to receive some documents from him, I didn’t receive them, therefore we cannot discuss the budget, without first seeing the full documentation.”

At the end of the meeting, Kobi said, “There are a lot of hard feelings here, feelings in the city, I want to put these feelings aside, and I ask everyone to act rationally and pass the budget today. I ask you to act responsibly and understand that we are at the last stage before the interference of the Interior Ministry, and you know what you need to do before that happens. The job of the council members is to approve the budget until June 30, which is the determining date.”

At this stage, the mayor raised the budget proposal to a vote: “I am going to raise the vote for the budget, who is in favor, who is against and who is abstaining?”

As mentioned, the motion fell, with six voting in favor and nine against.