Europe

Home page

Europe

Irish government launches major Cabinet shuffle

21 January 2011 04:05 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. Prime Minister Brian Cowen has launched a major pre-election shuffle of his embattled administration, with a third of his 15-member Cabinet resigning to make way for new faces, APA reports quoting businessweek.com website.
Overnight resignations left vacancies to lead the departments of justice, health, defense and transport. Cowen temporarily took charge of foreign affairs.
The outgoing transport minister, Noel Dempsey, said Thursday he expects Cowen to appoint new politicians from his Fianna Fail party to all vacant posts within hours.
The surprise transformation of the administration precedes an as-yet-unscheduled national election expected in late March.
Earlier this week Cowen defeated a leadership challenge from Cork lawmaker Micheal Martin, who resigned from his post as foreign minister.