Chile’s leftist president-elect, Gabriel Boric, announced his first Cabinet on Friday, giving a majority of posts to women and several to former student protest leaders. Out of 24 members of Gabriel Boric’s Cabinet, 14 are women.
Chile’s millennial president-elect, Gabriel Boric, has named a progressive cabinet, with a ministerial team which for the first time anywhere in the Americas is dominated by women.
“We have put together this group of people who are well-prepared, who have knowledge and experience, who are committed to the programme of changes that the country needs, and have the capacity to combine viewpoints, different perspectives and new visions,” said Boric.
14 women and 10 men – with an average age of 49 – were named as ministers in a cabinet which combines experienced moderates with former leaders from the 2011 education protest movement where Boric forged his political ideals.
“Something has changed,” Juan Gabriel Valdes, a former foreign minister, wrote on Twitter, posting two photos: one of the incoming Cabinet and another from the 1990 all-male government when Chile had just returned to democracy.
“This cabinet is very important for us,” said Karol Cariola, 34, a lawmaker for Chile’s Communist Party, which is allied with Boric’s broad leftist coalition.
“It can reflect not only Chile’s diversity but also the need to progress to a decentralized country, a feminist country, one where we do not have limitations in political participation.”
Chile’s new defence minister is the granddaughter of the socialist president Salvador Allende, who was deposed in Pinochet’s bloody 1973 coup d’état. Maya Fernández, 50, will preside over long-overdue reforms of the military that overthrew Chile’s democracy.
Dr Izkia Siches, 35, the popular former head of the national medical union, will be the first woman ever to preside over Chile’s interior ministry. At 32, the new minister for women and gender equality, Antonia Orellana, is the youngest member of the cabinet.
The new foreign minister will be 53-year-old lawyer Antonia Urrejola, former president of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.
Marcela Hernando, 61, a centrist lawmaker, will be in charge of the mining sector in the world’s top copper producer, while Maisa Rojas, 49, a well-respected climate scientist, will take over the ministry of environment. Boric has signaled a focus on climate and environmental protection.
Boric’s sports minister, Alexandra Benado, 45, is a former national team footballer whose mother was murdered by state agents while she was a member of the Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria (MIR). She is the first openly lesbian minister in Chile’s history.
The average age is 49. The youngest, at 32, is new Women’s Affairs Minister Antonia Orellana. Seven of the cabinet members are in their 30s.
Sources: Guardian, DW, Reuters