SANTIAGO -- Chilean President Ricardo Lagos announced late on Thursday a cabinet tweak, bringing a former mayor of the downtown center of the capital city on to his team with the aim of talking up job creation.

Government Spokesman Claudio Huepe said Jaime Ravinet will replace Claudio Orrego at the Housing and State Property Ministry after a brief ceremony to be held on Friday at the La Moneda Presidential Palace.

It was the first cabinet change in Lagos' center-left ruling government coalition since the Socialists took over nine months ago from former president Eduardo Frei, who stepped down at the end of his six-year term.

Ravinet, a harismatic high-flyer in the centrist Christian Democrat Party, part of the ruling coalition, was previously mayor of the financial center of the capital city. He is a known as tough talker at ease with Chile's business leaders.

Political analysts believe Lagos brought ravinet into the cabinet to raise the profile of the ministry and help reactivate the construction sector to create jobs.

Unemployment, alongside sagging domestic spending, has been a major problem for Lagos' fledgling government. Figures released this week showed the jobless rate still high at 9.4 percent, although off the 2000 highs of 10.7 percent, as the economy has struggled to pull out of a 1998-1999 recession.

Growth in construction has lagged the recovery from recession -- gross domestic product expanded 5.8 percent in the first nine months of this year -- and has been blamed for the slow growth in employment.

Orrego, also a Christian Democrat, was seen as a capable leader at the helm of the Housing and State Property Ministry. But his low-profile technocrat style did not give the post sufficient public exposure, analysts said.

Government Spokesman Huepe, reading a statement from Lagos, said the president opted to make the change "in line with the future tasks and priorities established in the government."

(Reuter)