Yemeni Socialist Party
Numan joined the Yemeni National Front, which later became the Yemeni Socialist Party, when he was 17. In 1986 he became the Prime Minister of the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen from February 1986 until Yemeni unification in 1990, under Chairman Haidar Abu Bakr al-Attas, who preceded Numan as Prime Minister. Numan had previously been Minister of Fisheries and Deputy Prime Minister.