Bethel Finance: Court orders Steinitz to submit Asher as Tax Commissioner

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Bethel Finance news:
The High Court of Justice today ordered Minister of Finance Yuval Steinitz to submit the recommendation to appoint Moshe Asher as director general of the Israel Tax Authority. The court made the extraordinary ruling in Asher's petition against Steinitz, after the latter rejected the search committee's recommendation of Asher to the post, and ordered the establishment of a new search committee.

The three-judge panel, headed by High Court Vice President Eliezer Rivlin, with Judge Eliyakim Rubinstein and Judge Uzi Vogelman, gave the ruling. Rivlin said that the case involved an extraordinary convergence of circumstances which required the court's intervention: the state did not meet the norm that rejecting the search committee's recommendation requires a special explanation, especially when the search committee operated instead of a public tender for the position.

Rivlin added that the state also disregarded the fact that Asher has an outstanding personal and professional record, and that the search committee's members were outstanding professionals. The government decision to appoint a search committee was based on the historical difficulty in previous appointments to the Tax Authority; and the serious case of a former Tax Authority director, which seriously harmed the authority's integrity.

Rivlin concluded that Steinitz's intention to change the threshold conditions of the appointment in the midst of the appointment process was tantamount to changing the rules of the game while it was being played. He added that there was nothing substantive in Steinitz's position that would overcome the damage caused in distorting the search committee's work.

Rubinstein said that, under the circumstances, it was the right and responsible thing to recommend Asher to the cabinet for the position at the Tax Authority.