Countries With The Oldest Leaders

Ismaïl Omar Guelleh, often known by his initials IOG, has served as Djibouti’s president since 1999. In April 2021, Guelleh was elected to a fifth term, receiving over 97% of the vote. The opposition party accused him and his supporters of fraud and stuffing ballot boxes to rig the election, a charge which his administration denied.

This term would be, in theory, his final term, as Djibouti’s constitution bars candidates ages 75 and older from running for president. However, Guelleh has already amended the constitution before, in 2010, to remove term limits for presidents.

Sheikh Hasina was elected prime minister of Bangladesh in 2009 after having previously served from 1996 to 2001. She is the daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, a former Bangladeshi president who was an important figure in the nation’s separation from Pakistan in 1971.

During Sheikh Hasina’s tenure, Bangladesh has allowed for some Rohingya refugees fleeing genocide in Myanmar into the country. Yet the conditions these refugees have been placed in is inhospitable in many cases. Her government has also been accused of suppressing dissent and muzzling free speech.

Mario Draghi was sworn in as Italy’s Prime Minister in February 2021, after the previous head of state, Giuseppe Conte, resigned. Conte was unable to keep the coalition together due to a dispute over EU-provided COVID-19 relief funds.

Draghi made his name as an economist. He was president of the European Central Bank from 2011 to 2019 and is largely credited with helping save the Euro and stabilize the region amid the European Debt Crisis beginning 2009.

Muhyiddin Yassin took over as Malaysian prime minister in March 2020, after the previous prime minister, Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamed, resigned. Politically, Yassin has been battling opponents from outside his party claiming his government is illegitimate as well as opposition from within.

Yassin has, as of July 2021, resisted calls from Malaysia’s king to reconvene parliament, which was suspended in January because of COVID-19. However, there is speculation in Malaysia that he could step down from his post due to pressure from opposition parties.

Keith Mitchell, who first became prime minister of Grenada in 1995, was reelected as PM in 2013. Mitchell’s previous tenures as PM have been tumultuous. He made an official visit to Cuba in 1997 despite objections from rival parties, and he signed an economic cooperation agreement with that country. In 2003, he became the target of corruption charges that were dismissed by a commission of inquiry in 2008.

Nicos Anastasiades was elected president of the Greek side of the Mediterranean island nation in 2013 with over 57% of the vote as voters believed he could help Cyprus emerge from a financial crisis. Weeks after his election, Anastasiades and European leaders agreed to terms of a bailout. Anastasiades’ government was credited with preserving the nation’s financial system. He also entered into reunification talks with the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus in 2015, though by 2021 those efforts had fizzled out.

Ralph Gonsalves became prime minister of the Caribbean nation in 2001 and has been in his post longer than any other prime minister in the country’s history. Gonsalves has served three times as PM. In 2009, he backed a referendum led by his Unity Labour Party to abolish the nation’s constitutional monarchy of Queen Elizabeth II. That effort was defeated. Gonsalves was sworn in for a fifth term in November 2020.

Hassanal Bolkiah assumed the throne of the Asian nation of Brunei in 1968 and named himself prime minister in 1984. Known for his flamboyant and profligate lifestyle in his younger days, the monarch has advocated for adopting Sharia penalties, including death by stoning for homosexuality.

Isaias Afwerki, one of the leaders of the Eritrean independence movement, was elected president of the East African nation in 1993. That same year, he was elected chairman of the National Assembly, which gave him control over the government’s executive and legislative branches. He also serves as commander in chief of the nation’s armed forces.

Afwerki has been criticized for being heavy handed throughout his tenure, canceling the presidential election in 1997 and suppressing the media. He sent troops to support Ethiopia — a nation Eritrea was at war with until 2018 — to fight against rebels in the Tigray region of Ethiopia in late 2020.

Abdelmadjid Tebboune took over as Algeria’s president in 2019. His predecessor, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, stepped down amid protests over political repression and economic uncertainty. In June 2021, Algeria’s parliamentary election was seen as a victory for Tebboune, as the majority of elected parliament members backed his agenda.

The vast majority of voters, however, did not participate in the election, with many boycotting the vote over disdain for establishment parties and claims that the army interfered with the election.

Daniel Ortega, the leader of the Sandinista guerrillas in Nicaragua during the 1970s, has been president of the Central American nation since 2007. He was first elected to the presidency in 1984. Following his election in 2007, Ortega backed programs to address hunger and illiteracy in Nicaragua and strove to create more private-sector jobs. Ortega was criticized for imposing restrictions on media coverage as well as drawing closer with Venezuela’s socialist president at the time, Hugo Chavez.

Thongloun Sisoulith became General Secretary of Laos’ ruling Communist Party in March of 2021. He ascended the ranks, going from foreign minister to prime minister before taking over as general secretary. Sisoulith will serve a five-year term. He will also be the first person to serve in that position with no military background.

Though Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi is president of Yemen, he has been in exile for more than five years. In September 2014, Houthi rebels seized control of the northern part of the country and its capital city of Sanaa, forcing Hadi to flee to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Hadi has reportedly been in poor health for over a year, after suffering a heart attack in 2020.

Tuilaepa Aiono Sailele Malielegaoi, who’s been prime minister of the Pacific island nation of Samoa since 1998, has a credential few other world leaders can claim. Malielegaoi won the silver medal in target archery at the South Pacific Games in 2007. Samoa, a country of about 200,000 people, was governed by New Zealand until it voted for independence in 1961.

Rodrigo Duterte is the outspoken and controversial president of the Philippines. Born into a politically active family, Duterte’s father was the governor of the province Davao. Duterte represented Davao City for decades as a prosecutor, vice mayor, mayor, and representative. He made international news for his endorsement of killing squads to target drug dealers, which helped his bid for the presidency in 2016.

Francisco Sagasti is one of just 18 world leaders that is over 75 years old, though his time as Peru’s president is going to be short-lived. Sagasti was a congress member when President Martín Vizcarra was ousted over bribery allegations in November 2020. After Vizcarra’s successor, Manuel Merino, stepped down following a week of protests, congress members elected Sagasti president.

Sagasti oversaw Peru’s presidential election in June 2021. In the election, outsider socialist candidate Pedro Castillo appears to have defeated right-wing candidate Keiko Fujimori, though the results were being contested as of June 2021. Sagasti’s term is scheduled to end on July 28, 2021.

Nguyễn Phú Trọng in 2011 was elected as General Secretary of The Communist Party of Vietnam, the most powerful office in the country. He also was elected president of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam seven years later. Trọng has intensified Vietnam’s anti-corruption campaign against businessmen and political officials and jailed dissidents. He was reelected in January 2021.

Nana Akufo-Addo became president of the African nation of Ghana on the Atlantic Coast in 2017. He comes from a prominent Ghanian family that was involved in the nation’s quest for independence. Akufo-Addo held a variety of government positions — such as attorney general, minister of justice, and foreign minister — before becoming president. He ran twice for president before winning in 2017.

Denis Sassou Nguesso in March 2021 won the Republic of the Congo’s presidential election with 88% of the vote, extending his rule to 2026. Opponents said the election results were tainted by irregularities and ballot box stuffing.

Nguesso has been in power since 1979, funneling the profits from the Republic of the Congo’s plentiful natural resources to himself and allies, while nearly half of the country lives below the poverty line. Nguesso’s opponents are often jailed and exiled, while his most recent challenger in the presidential election died of COVID-19 on election day.

Muhammadu Buhari was elected to his second four-year term in 2019. In his campaign, he promised to root out corruption, using a broom to symbolize his pledge to clean up Nigeria. As he is in his late 70s, speculations about his health have dogged Buhari. He often receives health treatments outside the country, refusing to say why. Buhari even had to fend off a rumor that he died and was replaced by a body double.

Joe Biden was elected the 46th president of the United States in 2020, defeating incumbent Donald Trump, who was also in his 70s. Biden had previously served as vice president for two terms under President Barack Obama and represented Delaware in the U.S. Senate for 36 years.

Biden in March 2021 signed a $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill that funded vaccine distribution, provided cash payments to millions of Americans, and supported unemployment benefits and health care efforts.

Emmerson Mnangagwa became president of Zimbabwe in 2017, after serving as vice president to Robert Mugabe. Mugabe, who had been the only leader Zimbabwe had known since gaining independence, resigned after 37 years in power. Mnangagwa took over the presidency in what seemed like a military coup, but both the military and Mugabe insisted it was not.

Mnangagwa is divisive in the country because he has been accused of plotting attacks on supporters of his political opponents. He has consistently been accused of corruption, costing the country billions.

Alassane Ouattara won a contentious election in 2010 to take over as president of Ivory Coast. His opponent, who rejected the UN-certified results declaring Ouattara the winner, was arrested, and Ouattara was sworn in May 2011.

Protests broke out after his reelection in 2020. The Ivorian constitution has a two-term limit, but Ouattara said he decided to run for a third term after his preferred successor died. The highest court in the country cleared the way for him to run again, and an election commission, reportedly stacked to favor the president, barred dozens of potential candidates from running against Ouattara.

Hage Geingob has served as president of Namibia, a country in southwestern Africa, since 2014. The country gained its independence from South Africa in 1990. Geingob was recently implicated in a scandal in which he allegedly told associates to embezzle money from a state-owned fishing enterprise to bribe electors to secure his 2019 reelection as president.

President of Guinea Alpha Condé is one of just a handful of octogenarian world leaders, at age 83. His most recent reelection in 2020 was marred by violent protests and accusations of vote rigging. Opponents said he committed fraud to hold onto power and ran illegally for a third term, as Guinea’s constitution only allows for a president to serve for two terms. Condé said a referendum allowed him to run for a third term.

Following the death of his half brother Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Jaber al-Sabah in September 2020, Sheikh Nawaf al-Ahmad al-Jaber al-Sabah became the Emir of Kuwait at age 83. Previously, Sheikh Sabah held a variety of cabinet positions and was crown prince. He is the first emir who had not previously served as prime minister.

As the head of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis is one of the most influential world leaders. He is also the leader of Vatican City, which functions as its own independent nation-state. Its government, known as The Holy See, is led by the pope as the bishop of Rome. Pope Francis, born Jorge Mario Bergoglio in late 1936 in Argentina, ascended to the papacy in 2013 when Pope Benedict XVI resigned due to health concerns.

Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud held various offices before ((being named the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia in 2012–optional)) and becoming king in 2015 after the death of his half-brother, King Abdullah.

Salman, king and prime minister of Saudi Arabia, arrested three senior Saudi princes, including his younger brother, in 2017 to head off an apparent coup. The action appeared to benefit Salman’s son, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the nation’s de facto leader and likely successor to the throne. During the elder Salman’s reign, women in Saudi Arabia gained the right to vote in municipal elections.

Mahmoud Abbas is one of the world’s oldest leaders at age 85. He has served as president of Palestine since 2005. Before that, he helped negotiate the 1993 Oslo Accords in which Israel and Palestine agreed to recognize one another as legitimate states. However, in 2015 he said Palestine would no longer honor the agreement, saying Israel had violated the accords.

Though Abbas previously committed to holding elections in 2021, he said in April that voting would be delayed over concerns that Israel would interfere with the process or prevent it altogether.

Paul Biya has served as president of the African nation of Cameroon since 1982. He won his seventh seven-year term in 2018, after abolishing term limits in 2008. Biya has been criticized for being an absentee chief executive, spending extensive time overseas, and his time as president has been marked by charges of corruption and erosion of democratic institutions.