Najib Mikati
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| Najib Mikati | |
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| In office 15 April 2005 – 19 July 2005 |
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| Deputy | Elias Murr |
| Preceded by | Omar Karami |
| Succeeded by | Fouad Siniora |
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| Born | November 24, 1955  Tripoli, Lebanon |
| Political party | Independent |
| Religion | Sunni Islam |
| Lebanon |
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Najib Mikati (Arabic: نجيب ميقاتي) (born November 24, 1955) is an international businessman and a former Prime Minister of Lebanon.
He was appointed Prime Minister by President Émile Lahoud on 15 April 2005, to succeed Omar Karami, who gave up after seven weeks of frustrated efforts to form a consensus government and resigned. He held office for three months, handing over on 19 July to Fouad Siniora.
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[edit] Early Life
Mikati graduated from the American University of Beirut in 1980 with a Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree. He also attended a number of Executive and External programs at Harvard.
[edit] Business Career
He co-founded Investcom with his brother Taha in 1982, which has since grown into a telecommunications empire with significant investments in eight countries in Africa, the Middle East and Europe.[1] He sold the company in June 2006 to South Africa's MTN Group for $5.5 billion.[2] He remains involved with the company in his capacity as Vice Chairman.[3] In March 2008, Forbes magazine estimated that his wealth is about $2.6 billion, thereby ranking him #446 of the world's richest people.[4] Also according to Forbes, he is tied with his brother Taha for the #1 position amongst the richest Lebanese citizens.
[edit] Political Career
After being appointed to the Cabinet as Minister of Public Works and Transport on 4 December 1998, he was elected to the National Assembly from his hometown of Tripoli in 2000, outpolling Omar Karami, who was elected from the same multimember constituency. As a parliamentarian, he retained his cabinet position and developed a reputation as a moderately pro-Syrian politician with a good relationship with Syrian President Bashar Assad.
He was a perennial candidate for Lebanon's Prime Ministry since 2000 before taking office in 2005 after the resignation of Omar Karami on 13 April 2005.
In the negotiations to form a government, Mikati emerged as a consensus candidate. Despite his closeness to Syria, his willingness to compromise and his promise to dismiss the chiefs of the security forces, whom many Lebanese suspected of involvement in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri on 14 February 2005, won him the support of the anti-Syrian opposition, against the strongly pro-Syrian Minister of Defence, Abdul Rahim Mourad. "We will be the symbol of moderation and national unity," Mikati declared after being sworn in at the Presidential palace in Baabda.
[edit] Resignation
Mikati's immediate priority was to prepare Lebanon for crucial parliamentary elections, which were scheduled to be held by 31 May 2005. Constitutionally, a government must be in place to call for an election, and opposition politicians had accused President Lahoud and former Prime Minister Karami of stalling the formation of a government in order to thwart the elections, which anti-Syrian parties believed they could win. Mikati's government succeeded in organizing the election, that saw the opposition, that was now known as the March 14 Movement, win 72 out of the 128 seats in the National Assembly.
| Preceded by Omar Karami |
Prime Minister of Lebanon 2005 |
Succeeded by Fouad Siniora |
