JOHN Swinney has responded after it was confirmed an SNP rebel amendment which could wreck his own independence plans will be debated at the party's upcoming conference.
The SNP conference will be held in Aberdeen next month, where members will vote on a strategy for achieving independence put forward by the First Minister.
Yet The National told how Swinney's independence strategy is facing a wrecking amendment from rebel members.
The current strategy hinges on the SNP winning a majority of seats at the 2026 Holyrood election.
However, not all SNP members support this approach, with a group calling for the party to keep its previous strategy that all votes for pro-independence parties should count towards a mandate to begin negotiations with Westminster to dissolve the Union, as well as setting a date for independence day.
A previous bid to lodge a motion in this vein was rejected from the conference agenda, despite being backed by 43 local branches.
But the party’s conference agenda has since revealed that the rebels' amendment has been selected for debate.
Responding on Wednesday, the First Minister said debate around the SNP's independence strategy was part of being "a democratic political party".
Swinney made the comments after an event at the SEC in Glasgow, where he announced an expansion of the integrated poverty support programme in Scotland.
The First Minister told The National: "I lead a democratic political party. I told people that we'd have open debate, and do you know what we're having? Open debate.
"The conference will decide, I've got my proposals there, I believe they're the right way forward for the party, and it's for the party to make it's choices.
"That's what have in an open democratic political party. I read all this stuff suggesting the party doesn't have that, but then when we do have it, it's a problem."
The First Minister also rejected suggestions from the media that the SNP is "in chaos", pointing towards recent polling by The National which found the SNP were set to have a major lead in both Westminster and Holyrood votes.
The Find Out Now survey run for The National from September 15 to 21 found that Scottish Labour would lose all but six of their Westminster seats if a new General Election were held tomorrow.
Swinney told journalists on Wednesday: "I noticed an opinion poll yesterday that the SNP is leading the opinion polls by a country mile."
When asked by a journalist if he "rejects the suggestion that the SNP is in chaos" with the recent resignation of Jamie Hepburn and the appointment of a new chief executive, he responded: "Yes."
