Ex-banker Wirjawan says to head Indonesian investment board

BOGOR, Indonesia, Oct 18 - Former investment banker Gita Wirjawan on Sunday told Reuters that Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono had appointed him head of the Investment Coordinating Board, a new cabinet position.

His role will be to boost foreign and domestic investment in Southeast Asia's biggest economy and attract capital inflows in order to boost economic growth and create jobs.

Wirjawan, a former banker with JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs who now runs an investment firm specialising in the energy sector, spoke to reporters as he left a meeting with Yudhoyono at the President's house near Bogor, south of the capital Jakarta.

"I have been given a mandate by the president to do things related to capital inflow and investment in Indonesia," he told reporters.

"This task will focus not only on capital inflow but also hopefully can be in line with the president's vision to reduce unemployment and poverty rate in Indonesia, and it also concerns investment put in the real sector."

He told Reuters separately that the job was head of the country's Investment Co-ordinating Board, which will become a new cabinet post.

Yudhoyono, a reformist ex-general who won a second, five-year term in A presidential election in July, is due to announce his cabinet next week, following his inauguration on October 20.