Manama: Bahrain on Saturday evening announced a new cabinet of 17 ministers after some portfolios were merged and others dropped.
The four deputies to the prime minister and the ministers of follow-up interior, foreign affairs, finance, oil, justice, works, transport, housing and health were not affected by the reshuffle that followed the quadrennial parliamentary elections, but the ministers of information, defence, industry, municipalities, parliament affairs and social development were replaced.
The ministries of telecommunications, municipalities and culture and the state ministry for foreign affairs were cancelled and
telecommunications were added to the ministry of transport and the municipalities moved under the ministry of works.
The three women in the outgoing cabinet, Shaikha Mai Bint Mohammad Al Khalifa, the minister of culture, Fatima Al Beloushi, the minister of social development, and Sameera Bin Rajab, the minister of information, were dropped in the reshuffle, but one woman, Faika Al Saleh, was appointed the new minister of social development.
Other ministers who left the cabinet are Shaikh Fawaz Bin Mohammad Al Khalifa, the minister of telecommunication, Shaikh Mohammad Bin Abdullah Al Khalifa, the state minister for defence affairs, Hassan Fakhro, the minister of industry and commerce, Juma Al Kaabi, the minister of municipalities, and Abdul Aziz Al Fadhel, the minister for parliament affairs.
The oil authority became the ministry of energy and the cabinet does not include a dedicated spokesperson for the government.
New faces in the cabinet are Jameel Al Humaidan who took over the labour ministry, Faika Al Saleh, the minister of social development, Zayed Bin Rashid Al Zayani, the minister of industry and commerce, and Eisa Abdul Rahman, the minister of information.
The new cabinet is expected to be sworn in on Sunday ahead of its first session.
