Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow

Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow is a Turkmen politician, lawyer and former dentist who was the second president of Turkmenistan from 2006 to 2022 and remains its most powerful figure as chairman of the People's Council. Born in 1957 in Babarap in the Ahal region, he trained in medicine, earned a doctorate in Moscow and rose through the dentistry faculty and the Ministry of Health, becoming health minister in 1997 and a deputy chairman of the Cabinet of Ministers in 2001 under Saparmurat Niyazov. After Niyazov died in December 2006 he was named acting president, the constitutional bar on an acting president standing was removed, and he won the 2007 election with about 89 percent of the vote, then was re-elected in 2012 and 2017 with more than 97 percent. His government is described as authoritarian and built around a cult of personality, and rights groups rank Turkmenistan among the most repressive states. He stepped down in March 2022 in favour of his son Serdar, and in 2023 the re-formed People's Council made him its chairman with the title National Leader of the Turkmen People.