(Bloomberg) — Brazil’s Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva tapped Amazon activist Marina Silva and new centrist ally Simone Tebet for key government positions as he seeks to deliver on promises of a diverse cabinet that includes more women, Black Brazilians and different parties from his coalition.
(Bloomberg) — Brazil’s Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva tapped Amazon activist Marina Silva and new centrist ally Simone Tebet for key government positions as he seeks to deliver on promises of a diverse cabinet that includes more women, Black Brazilians and different parties from his coalition.
Silva returns as environment minister, in what’s likely to be one of the biggest U-turns proposed by Lula after years of international outrage over outgoing President Jair Bolsonaro’s policies toward the Amazon rainforest. Tebet takes over the planning ministry, one of the four originating from the split of the current economy ministry.
“Never before in history had there been so many female cabinet members in Brazil,” the president-elect told reporters on Thursday as he unveiled his final 16 cabinet picks.
A total of 11 women will lead ministries in Lula’s administration, or about 30% of the 37 cabinet positions he’ll have. The president-elect also promised to appoint women to helm key public banks Banco do Brasil SA and Caixa Economica Federal.
“Banco do Brasil is 200 years old and it never had a woman as president. We are going to prove that a woman can be better than many men who ran that bank in Brazil,” Lula said, adding that he’ll push for legislation on equal pay for men and women.
Silva and Tebet
Marina Silva’s return to a cabinet position marks a new chapter in a relationship that had been strained for the past 14 years. Silva was Lula’s first environment minister from 2003 until 2008, when she left his government and the Workers’ Party amid growing disagreements with then Chief of Staff Dilma Rousseff, who would be later catapulted into the presidency.
Silva ran for president three times, coming in third in her first two attempts while gaining international recognition for her environmental work.
Senator Simone Tebet, who came in third in the first round of the October presidential election before joining the coalition that helped Lula win, has vowed to work in harmony with incoming Finance Minister Fernando Haddad. Among their first challenges will be the creation of a new fiscal framework that will replace the current spending cap rule, breached several times since its introduction in 2017.
Read More: Lula’s Centrist Ally Tebet Accepts Brazil Planning Ministry
Other cabinet picks announced by Lula on Thursday:
- Gonçalves Dias for the Institutional Security Office
- Paulo Pimenta as the Secretary of Social Communications
- Carlos Fávaro as Minister of Agriculture
- Waldez Góes as Minister of Integration
- André de Paula as Minister of Fisheries
- Carlos Lupi as Minister of Social Security
- Jader Filho as Minister of Cities
- Juscelino Filho as Minister of Communications
- Paulo Teixeira as Rural Development Minister
- Ana Moser as Minister of Sports
- Daniela Carneiro as Minister of Tourism
- Sonia Guajajara as Minister of Indigenous Peoples
- Renan Filho as Minister of Transport
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