The Iranian Parliament may not give a vote of confidence to at least seven nominees proposed for the new cabinet, a reformist MP warned on Monday.
"President Mohammad Khatami had better propose at least seven other candidates for the countries' top managerial posts," Mohammad-Reza Khabbaz told the official Iranian news agency, IRNA.
"We expected the president to name a stronger cabinet in a bid to more effectively handle the nation's problems," he said.
"The (pro-reform) Khordad-2 Front will hold several sessions with the proposed cabinet embers in order to get acquainted with their future plans," Khabbaz added.
He noted that a minister should be adequately professional and experienced.
“Some of the nominees are politically inexperienced,” he told the agency.
Khatami, who took his oath of office Wednesday in Parliament, appointed only five new faces to his new cabinet Sunday, retaining several core ministers.
Under the Constitution, the president's appointees must win a vote of confidence in Parliament before they can assume office.
Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh kept his job despite extensive criticism over the past months for alleged anomalies at his ministry, particularly its approval of a number of buy-back deals with some foreign companies, IRNA said.
Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi, Intelligence Minister Ali
Younessi, Defense Minister Rear Admiral Ali Shamkhani and Interior Minister Abdolvahed Mousavi Lari were also reinstated.
Parliament must ratify the new appointments and will begin debating them next Sunday.
The new ministers, all long-standing bureaucrats, were appointed to the ministries of finance and economics, health, roads and transport, labor and social affairs, and cooperatives – Albawaba.com
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
