Asif Ali Zardari

Biography

Asif Ali Zardari was born in Karachi in 1955, the son of Hakim Ali Zardari, a Sindhi landowner and tribal chief, and was educated at Karachi Grammar School. He rose to prominence after marrying Benazir Bhutto in 1987, the year before she became prime minister, and was widely criticised over corruption allegations when her first government was dismissed in 1990.

In Bhutto's second government he served as minister of the environment from 1993 and as investment minister. After its dismissal in 1996 he was arrested and charged with corruption and with the murder of Bhutto's brother Murtaza; he spent years in prison, nominally sitting in the National Assembly and then the Senate, until his release in 2004 and exile in Dubai.

After Bhutto's assassination in December 2007 he became co-chairman of the Pakistan People's Party, led it to victory in the 2008 elections, helped force Pervez Musharraf to resign, and was elected president that September. He signed the Eighteenth Amendment in 2010, which stripped the presidency of many of its powers, and in 2013 became the first elected president to complete a full term. Following the 2024 general election he was elected president again in March 2024.