The Labor party's central elections committee decided on Tuesday afternoon to postpone the party's primary elections. The decision was made after many party members had already voted in the elections, which began on Tuesday morning and were to end on Tuesday evening. The votes already submitted will be discarded.
The elections were pushed off due to serious technical glitches in the Labor party's new electronic voting system. The glitches caused serious delays, and left thousands who attempted to vote unable to do so.
The elections committee originally decided to postpone the elections until December 10. However, Minister Raleb Majadele, a member of the party, quickly reminded the committee that the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha (Festival of Sacrifice) and therefore many Muslims would not vote on that day.
The committee chose to hold the elections on Thursday of this week instead, December 4. Voting will begin at noon and continue until 10 p.m. The rescheduled primaries will be held using traditional paper slips to vote and not the failed electronic system.
Senior members of the Labor party said they worried that the failed round of voting would discourage primary voters and party activists. “We have to do a fundamental examination of what went wrong, and we need to salute the Labor members who came and patiently waited,” said former party head Amir Peretz. Welfare Minister Yitzchak Herzog expressed similar concerns, and asked party leaders to call on voters and activists “not to give up.”
Peretz, Herzog and others emphasized the need to hold primaries as soon as possible, so that the party can begin its national election campaign.
Labor secretary MK Eitan Cabel faced criticism due to the failed primaries. His publicist issued a statement in his defense, saying, “We need to remember that there's a company here, Tel-Dor, that ran tests, and yet everything went wrong. It's a long way between that and coming to far-reaching conclusions regarding individuals.”
The Tel-Dor company, which provided the voting machines that malfunctioned on Tuesday, said the system had worked during a pilot test. The system is the first of its kind in Israel, they said, and had been tested several times before it was put into use.
The company issued a statement apologizing for the errors and expressing understanding for the Labor party's decision to stop the Tuesday elections. Tel-Dor supports the party's decision to switch to manual voting on the new primaries date, the statement said.
Forty-one candidates are vying for top slots on the Labor party list. The first, seventh, and twelfth slots have already been reserved, for party head Ehud Barak, party secretary Eitan Cabel and Minister of Agriculture Shalom Simchon respectively. Polls predict that the party will win fewer than 10 seats in the next Knesset.