PA announces government reshuffle, Hamas calls move a 'coup'
JULY 30, 2015 6:11 P.M. (UPDATED: JULY 30, 2015 6:14 P.M.)
BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- The Palestinian Authority on Thursday announced that a long awaited reshuffle of the Palestinian cabinet had been agreed upon, Palestinian officials told Ma'an.
Hussein
al-Araj, formerly the Deputy Minister of Local Governance and Governor
of Nablus and Hebron, will serve as the Minister of Local Governance,
sources said.
Sabri Saydam will serve as the Minister of Education. He formerly served as the Minister of Communications and Information Technology.
Former
Minister of Public Works, Deputy Minister of Planning and International
Cooperation, and representative of The Palestine Investment Fund, Samih
al-Abed, will become the Minister of Transportation.
Sufian
Sultan, the former head of the Palestinian Environmental Authority --
which was later merged, in part, into the Ministry of Agriculture --
will serve as the Minister of Agriculture, while Abeer Odeh will serve
as the Minister of National Economy.
Odeh served as the CEO of Palestine Capital Market Authority, a governmental financial institution.
The new ministers will be sworn-in on Friday after prayers in the Palestinian Presidential headquarters in Ramallah.
There
had been talk of a reshuffle for months, but in mid-June it was
announced at a Fatah council meeting that the entire government would
soon be dissolved.
The reshuffle is an attempt to preserve and reform the body, instead of dismantling it.
The
unity government was formed in June 2014 in a bid to end division
between the Fatah-led PLO and Hamas, but has so far been unsuccessful in
doing so.
The Hamas movement said Thursday that it disapproved of the unity government's reshuffle and called the move “unconstitutional and outside consensus.”
Hamas
spokesperson, Sami Abu Zuhri, added that the reshuffle represents a
coup on the unity deal and said that the PA has become a separatist
government.
Officials
told Ma'an in June that Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah's resignation was
an imminent part of the reshuffle, but it has yet to officially
materialize.
Hamdallah also serves as the Minister of Interior.
The
other 19 ministry positions have remained unchanged. Currently, four
ministers hold positions as heads of up to three different ministries.
Attempts
for reform came after the unity government formed in June last year
repeatedly failed to overcome divisive issues between Fatah and Hamas.
Power has remained divided between the Hamas-led Gaza Strip and Fatah-dominated West Bank since 2007.
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