Irfaan Ali

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Irfaan Ali (born 25 April 1980) is the Guyanese politician who has served as the President of Guyana since August 2, 2020. A member of the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C), he previously was the Minister of Housing and Water from 2009 to 2015 and has held various roles in government and Parliament. He was the PPP/C’s presidential candidate for the 2020 election and won, becoming Guyana’s 10th president. He was re-elected for a second term in the 2025 general election.

Ali is the first Muslim to become Guyana’s president and one of the few Muslim heads of state in the Americas. He was born in Leonora, Guyana, into an Indo-Guyanese Muslim family; his parents were teachers, and he spent part of his youth on the island of Leguan. He has studied widely, earning a PhD in Urban and Regional Planning from the University of the West Indies, an MA in manpower planning from Anglia Ruskin University, an LLM in international commercial law from the University of Salford, and a BA in business management from the University of Sunderland, among other qualifications. He has also worked for the Caribbean Development Bank and the State Planning Secretariat, and has been a member of parliament since 2006.

Ali is married to Arya Ali since 2017, and they have three children. He has received several honors, including the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman from India (2023) and the Order of Freedom of Barbados (2023). In 2024, he served as the CARICOM Chairman for part of the year.