Brazil's Lula wraps up Cabinet, tilts to the left

Reuters, 12.23.02, 7:14 PM ET

BRASILIA, Brazil, Dec 23 (Reuters) - Brazilian President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva completed the selection of his Cabinet on Monday, bypassing some of the conservative parties that supported his campaign in favor of heavyweights from his left-wing Workers' Party. Only seven of the 26 ministries went to parties that campaigned on behalf of Lula's Workers' Party, which received 14 portfolios. The remaining five posts, including the influential Trade Ministry, went to business leaders and career diplomats with no party affiliation. The only Cabinet seat awarded on Monday to a conservative ally was the Transport Ministry, which will be headed by Anderson Adauto, a member of the Liberal Party, to which Lula's vice president, Jose Alencar, belongs. The Cabinet picks, who do not require congressional confirmation, will be sworn in with Lula on New Year's Day. "Everyone may believe that the people that have been called on may have defects, which is true of any human being," Lula said when announcing his final Cabinet picks. "But the raw truth is that we've chosen, if not all, some of those who are going to give all of themselves for the better of this country." The appointments followed Lula's decision on Friday to leave the powerful opposition Brazilian Democratic Party out of his government, choosing instead to give the labor, education, energy and health ministries to members of his Workers' Party. The biggest job announced on Monday went to Lula's longtime economic adviser and fellow Workers' Party member Guido Mantega, a university professor, who was named planning and budget minister, a portfolio the president-elect has touted as all powerful in the new government. Lula previously selected one of his closest allies, Workers' Party moderate Antonio Palocci, to head the Finance Ministry, the government's other top economic post. To run the Ministry of Culture, Lula called on pop star Gilberto Gil, a founder of the counterculture Tropicalist movement that revolutionized Brazilian music in the 1960s. Gil, who sports dreadlocks, is a member of the leftist Green Party. Other key portfolios such as social security, agrarian development and the new ministries of food security and social assistance were given on Monday to Workers' Party stalwarts. Miro Teixeira, a longtime legislator of the leftist Democratic Workers' Party, was named communications minister. Ciro Gomes, who ran against Lula for president on the Popular Socialist Party ticket, was tapped to head the obscure National Integration Ministry. Last week, Lula named prominent business leader Luiz Fernando Furlan as trade minister, and former FleetBoston executive Henrique Meirelles as Central Bank president.