Americas News
Chile's president-elect chooses cabinet of half men, half women
By DPA
Jan 31, 2006, 19:00 GMT

Santiago - Chilean president-elect Michelle Bachelet announced late Monday the members of her cabinet, half of whom are to be women.

The cabinet of 10 men and 10 women represents 'a historic step for equality' in conservative, patriarchal Chile, the Socialist politician and Chile's first woman president said.

As Chile's top diplomat, Bachelet selected Alejandro Foxley. His fellow Christian Democrat Andres Zaldivar will head the Interior Ministry.

Ingrid Antonijevic of the left-leaning Party for Democracy (PPD) is to become the new finance minister, and Bachelet gave one of her former portfolios to another PPD member, engineer Vivianne Blanlot, the second woman to hold the post in Chile.

The paediatrician-turned-politician who herself served as defence and health minister before being elected president last month intends to fill two other cabinet posts. She will ask Congress to create two new ministries: environment and public security.

Analysts pointed out that the most important ministries were also equally divided between men and women.

Foxley, a civil engineer and economist, served as Chile's first finance minister after democracy returned to the country following its 1973-1990 military dictatorship.

Zaldivar, a former senator, served in the cabinet before the 1973 coup that ushered in Augusto Pinochet's military dictatorship. He was a leading Pinochet opponent in exile.

Antonijevic is a commercial lawyer, business executive and one of the founders of the PPD.

Bachelet will follow Ricardo Lagos as president when she is sworn in March 11 to a four-year term.

She was elected in a January 15 runoff election with 53.5 per cent of the vote.

Her four-party Coalition of Parties for Democracy has ruled Chile since the end of Pinochet's rule. She was briefly jailed under the regime before fleeing into exile.