President-Elect Michelle Bachelet names cabinet

President-Elect Michelle Bachelet named her cabinet yesterday, following her victory as the center-left Concertacion candidate in the January 15th runoff election with 53.5% of the vote. The Concertacion coalition has been in government since 1990, and the new government will ensure continuity with current fiscal policy. The new cabinet will take up their posts on March 11, 2006. Key appointments include:

Minister of Finance: Andres Velasco – currently Sumitomo Professor of International Finance and Development at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, he holds a PhD in Economics from Columbia University, USA and has been a Post-Doctoral Fellow at Harvard and MIT (1994-5).

Foreign Minister: Alejandro Foxley – ex-Minister of Finance (1990-1994), ex-President of the Senate Finance committee, he holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Wisconsin, USA.

Interior Minister: Andres Zaldivar – a Senator since 1990, he has been Minister of Finance (1968-1970) and President of the Senate Finance committee (1990-1998).

The cabinet fulfills President-Elect Bachelet’s campaign promise to appoint an equal number of men and women to ministerial rank. 10 members of the cabinet are women, and their appointments include the Defense, Health, Economy and Presidential General Secretary (Chief of Staff) Ministries. Nonetheless, Dr Bachelet has made clear that the appointments are based purely on merit.

Source: Ministry of Finance