page_title: Ashraf Ghani
section_title: Personal life
hierarchical_section_title: Ashraf Ghani / Personal life
caption_attribution_description: The London Conference on Afghanistan takes place on 4 December 2014, co-hosted by the governments of the UK and Afghanistan. The Conference brings together the Afghan government and international community in support of a secure and peaceful future for Afghanistan. Find out more at: www.gov.uk/government/topical-events/london-conference-on... Picture: Patrick Tsui/FCO Free-to-use photo This image is posted under a Creative Commons - Attribution Licence, in accordance with the Open Government Licence. You are free to embed, download or otherwise re-use it, as long as you credit the source as ‘Patrick Tsui/FCO’.
context_page_description: Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai is an Afghan politician who is serving as the President of Afghanistan. He was first elected on 20 September 2014 and was re-elected in the 28 September 2019 presidential election. He was announced the winner after a protracted process in February 2020 and was sworn in for a second term on 9 March 2020. An anthropologist by education, he previously served as Minister of Finance and the Chancellor of Kabul University.
  Before returning to Afghanistan in 2002, Ghani was a professor of anthropology at numerous institutions, and later started working with the World Bank. As the Finance Minister of Afghanistan between July 2002 and December 2004, he led Afghanistan's attempted economic recovery after the collapse of the Taliban government.
  He is the co-founder of the Institute for State Effectiveness, an organization set up in 2005 to improve the ability of states to serve their citizens. In 2005 he gave a TED talk, in which he discussed how to rebuild a broken state such as Afghanistan. He is a member of the Commission on Legal Empowerment of the Poor, an independent initiative hosted by the United Nations Development Programme.
context_section_description: Ashraf Ghani is married to Rula Saade, Rula Saade Ghani was born in a Lebanese Christian family. The couple married after they met during their studies at the American University of Beirut, Lebanon during the 1970s. They eventually settled in the United States and obtained U.S. citizenship. However, Ghani renounced his U.S. citizenship in 2009 so he could run in Afghan elections.
  Ashraf and Rula Ghani have two children, a daughter, Mariam, a Brooklyn-based visual artist, and a son, Tariq. Both were born in the United States and carry U.S. citizenship and passports. In an unusual move for a politician in Afghanistan, Ghani at his presidential inauguration in 2014 publicly thanked his wife, acknowledging her with an Afghan name, Bibi Gul. "I want to thank my partner, Bibi Gul, for supporting me and Afghanistan," he said. "She has always supported Afghan women and I hope she continues to do so."
  Ashraf Ghani also owns 200 acres of land in Surkhab area of Logar province. Abdul Baqi Ahmadzai, who is close to Ashraf Ghani, claims that Ashraf Ghani inherited a lot of land from his father. However, Ashraf Ghani bought this 200 acres of land separately in Logar province.
  Ghani lost most of his stomach after suffering from cancer in the 1990s. It is said that Ghani wakes up every morning before five, and reads for two to three hours.
  He is the older brother of Hashmat Ghani Ahmadzai, an Afghan politician who is the Grand Council Chieftain of the Kuchis.
caption: President Ghani at a conference in 2014
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