This week, votes were cast to reshape Switzerland’s cabinet, known as the Federal Council. The high profile Alain Berset, minister of health during the Covid-19 pandemic, was replaced and a new chancellor was elected, reported SRF.
Beat Jans, Basel-Stadt Socialist Party district president Beat Jans will succeed Alain Berset and Viola Amherd will be Federal President in 2024.
Jans faced three other contenders from the Socialist Party for the position of Federal Councillor, a position vacated by Alain Berset. He garnered the most votes in the first two rounds before reaching a majority and achieving election in the third round.
The 59 year old joined the Socialist Party in 1998 before becoming party president of the canton of Basel-City in 2000. After many years in the cantonal government he resigned in 2011. In 2010, he became a Federal Councillor (member of parliament) before resigning in 2020 to become part of the executive government for Basel-City.
Jans will become the Federal Councillor in charge of the Federal Department of Justice and Police (FDJP), a role currently held by Elisabeth Baume-Schneider since January 2023. Baume-Schneider will take up the role of head of the Federal Department of Home Affairs (FDHA), which was headed by the outgoing Alain Berset and covers state pensions and health. The switch of portfolio came as a surprise to many journalists and politicians. Baume-Schneider has faced criticism for her handling of immigration.
Beat Jans was born in Basel in 1964. His father was a locksmith and his mother a salesperson. After a farming apprenticeship, he studied agroscience and the environment at ETHZ in Zurich. He has two children with his wife Tracy, an American he met while on holiday in Hawaii. Tracy is an HIV researcher at the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute.
In 2024, Viola Amherd, the minister of the Federal Department of Defence, Civil Protection and Sport, will become Switzerland’s ceremonial president – the president has no decision making capacity beyond the other six members of the Federal Council, which makes collective decisions in private. Amherd was born in 1962 and grew up in Brig-Glis in upper Valais. She studied law at the University of Fribourg and had her own law practice in Brig-Glis. She is not married.
Federal Councillors earn a salary of CHF 472,000 before tax. They also receive CHF 30,000 to cover expenses but must find their own accommodation in Bern and cover the cost themselves. They get a free train pass and free telecommunications. During their term they are exempt from military service, something only relevant to men of a certain age.
More on this:
SRF article (in German)
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