Barack Hussain Obama (Politician, America)

Barack Hussain Obama (born August 4, 1961) is the 44th and current President of the United States, and the first African American to hold the office. Born in Honolulu, Hawaii, Obama is a graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School, where he served as president of the Harvard Law Review. He was a community organizer in Chicago before earning his law degree. He worked as a civil rights attorney and taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School from 1992 to 2004. He served three terms representing the 13th District in the Illinois Senate from 1997 to 2004, running unsuccessfully for the United States House of Representatives in 2000.

In 2004, Obama received national attention during his campaign to represent Illinois in the United States Senate with his victory in the March Democratic Party primary, his keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in July, and his election to the Senate in November. He began his presidential campaign in 2007 and, after a close primary campaign against Hillary Rodham Clinton in 2008, he won sufficient delegates in the Democratic Party primaries to receive the presidential nomination. He then defeated Republican nominee John McCain in the general election, and was inaugurated as president on January 20, 2009. Nine months after his election, Obama was named the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize laureate.

During his first two years in office, Obama signed into law economic stimulus legislation in response to the Great Recession in the form of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and the Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Re-authorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010. Other major domestic initiatives in his first term included the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, often referred to as "Obamacare"; the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act; and the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010. In foreign policy, Obama ended U.S. military involvement in the Iraq War, increased U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan, signed the New START arms control treaty with Russia, ordered U.S. military involvement in Libya, and ordered the military operation that resulted in the death of Osama bin Laden. In January 2011, the Republicans regained control of the House of Representatives as the Democratic Party lost a total of 63 seats; and, after a lengthy debate over federal spending and whether or not to raise the nation's debt limit, Obama signed the Budget Control Act of 2011 and the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012.

Obama was reelected president in November 2012, defeating Republican nominee Mitt Romney, and was sworn in for a second term on January 20, 2013. During his second term, Obama has promoted domestic policies related to gun control in response to the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, and has called for full equality for LGBT Americans, while his administration has filed briefs which urged the Supreme Court to strike down the Defense of Marriage Act of 1996 and California's Proposition 8 as unconstitutional. In foreign policy, Obama ordered U.S. military involvement in Iraq in response to gains made by the Islamic Statein Iraq after the 2011 withdrawal from Iraq, continued the process of ending U.S. combat operations in Afghanistan, and has sought to normalize U.S. relations with Cuba.

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Benazir Bhutto (Politician, Pakistan)

Benazir Bhutto (21 June 1953 – 27 December 2007) was the 11th Prime Minister of Pakistan, serving two non-consecutive terms in 1988–90 and then 1993–96. A scion of the politically powerful Bhutto family, she was the eldest daughter of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, a former prime minister himself who founded the centre-left Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP).

In 1982, three years after her father's assassination, 29-year-old Benazir Bhutto became the chairperson of the PPP—a political party, making her the first woman in Pakistan to head a major political party. In 1988, she became the first woman to be elected as the head of an Islamic state's government; she also remains Pakistan's only female prime minister. Noted for her charismatic authority and political astuteness, Bhutto drove initiatives for Pakistan's economy and national security, and she implemented social-capitalist policies for industrial development and growth. In addition, her political philosophy and economic policies emphasized deregulation (particularly of the financial sector), flexible labour markets, the denationalization of state-owned corporations, and the withdrawal of subsidies to others. Bhutto's popularity waned amid recession, corruption, and high unemployment which later led to the dismissal of her government by conservative President Ghulam Ishaq Khan.

In 1993, Bhutto was elected for a second term after the 1993 parliamentary elections. She survived an attempted coup d'état in 1995, and her hard line against the trade unions and tough rhetorical opposition to her domestic political rivals and to neighboring India earned Iron Lady"; she was also respectfully referred to as "BB". In 1996, charges of corruption level against her led to the final dismissal of her government by President Farooq Leghari. Bhutto conceded her defeat in the 1997 Parliamentary elections and went into exile in Dubai in 1999. Nine years later, in 2007, she returned to Pakistan, having reached an understanding with President Pervez Musharraf, who granted her amnesty and withdrew all corruption charges against her. Bhutto was assassinated in a bombing on 27 December 2007, after leaving PPP's last rally in Rawalpindi, two weeks before the scheduled 2008 general election in which she was a leading opposition candidate. 

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David William Donald Cameron (Politician, England)

David William Donald Cameron (born 9 October 1966) is the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party. He represents Witney as its Member of Parliament (MP).

Cameron studied Philosophy, Politics and Economics (PPE) at Brasenose College, Oxford, gaining a first-class honors degree in 1988. He was described by his tutor, Professor Vernon Bogdanor, as "one of the ablest" students he has ever taught, with "moderate and sensible Conservative" political views. While at Oxford he was a member of the Bullingdon Club. He then joined the Conservative Research Department and became Special Adviser to Norman Lamont, and then to Michael Howard. He was Director of Corporate Affairs at Carlton Communications for seven years.

Cameron first stood for Parliament in Stafford in 1997. He ran on a Eurosceptic platform, breaking with his party's then-policy by opposing British membership of the single European currency, and was defeated by a swing close to the national average. He was first elected to Parliament in the 2001 general election for the Oxfordshire constituency of Witney. He was promoted to the Opposition front bench two years later, and rose rapidly to become head of policy co-ordination during the 2005 general election campaign. With a public image of a youthful, moderate candidate who would appeal to young voters, he won the Conservative leadership election in 2005.

In the 2010 United Kingdom general election held on 6 May, the Conservatives won 306 seats in a hung parliament. After five days of negotiation, Cameron formed a coalition with the Liberal Democrats (Lib Dems). Cameron leads the first coalition government of the United Kingdom since the Second World War. The 43-year-old Cameron became the youngest British Prime Minister since the Earl of Liverpool 198 years earlier.

Cameron's premiership has been marked by the ongoing effects of the late-2000s financial crisis leading to a large deficit in government finances, which his government has emphasized the need to reduce through austerity measures. His administration has introduced large-scale changes to welfare, immigration policy, education and healthcare, by introducing the Welfare Reform Act of 2012, the Education Act of 2011, the Health and Social Care Act of 2012 and a range of immigration reforms from 2010 on-wards, culminating in the Immigration Act of 2014. In 2011, Cameron became the first British Prime Minister to 'veto' an EU treaty. His government introduced a nationwide referendum on voting reform in 2011, a Falkland Islands sovereignty referendum in 2013, agreed to a Scottish independence referendum in September 2014, legalized same-sex marriages in England and Wales, met the United Nations target of spending at least 0.7% of GNI on aid to developing countries and promised an 'In/Out' Referendum on the European Union in 2017, after a period of renegotiation, if the Conservatives are re-elected with an outright majority.

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Imran Khan (Politician/Player, Pakistan)

Imran Khan (born on 25 November 1952) is a Pakistani politician and former cricketer. He played international cricket for two decades in the late twentieth century and, after retiring, entered politics. Besides his political activism, Khan is also a philanthropist, cricket commentator, chancellor of the University of Bradford and founding chairman of the Board of Governors of Shaukat Khanum Hospital. He also founded Namal College, Mianwali in 2008.

He was Pakistan's most successful cricket captain, leading his country to victory at the 1992 Cricket World Cup, playing for thePakistani cricket team from 1971 to 1992, and serving as its captain intermittently throughout 1982–1992. After retiring from cricket at the end of the 1987 World Cup in 1988, owing to popular demand he was requested to come back by the president of Pakistan Zia ul Haq to lead the team once again. At the age of 39, Khan led his team to Pakistan's first and only One Day World Cup victory in 1992. With 3807 runs and 362 wickets in Test cricket, he is one of eight world cricketers to have achieved an 'All-rounder's Triple' in Test matches. On 14 July 2010, Khan was inducted into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame.

In April 1996, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf ("Movement for Justice") political party was established and Khan became its chairman. He represented Mianwali as a member of the National Assembly from November 2002 to October 2007, he was again elected on 11 May 2013, while his party gained 35 seats in the National Assembly. Global Post mentioned him third in a list of nine world leaders of 2012 and recognized Khan as the face of the anti-drone movement in Pakistan. According to Asia Society, Khan was voted as Asia’s Person of the Year 2012. As the Pew Research Center, in 2012 a majority of Pakistani respondents offered a favorable opinion of Khan. The survey also revealed Khan's fame among youth. On 31 December 2014, news reports floated saying Khan has married British-Pakistani journalist Reham Khan.

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Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq (Politician, Pakistan)

Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq (12 August 1924 – 17 August 1988), was the sixth President of Pakistan from 1978 until his death in 1988, having declared martial law for the third time in the country's history in 1977. He was Pakistan's longest-serving head of state, ruling eleven years. He is most noted for his efforts to bring religion into mainstream society within Pakistan, and in foreign policy, for his close relationship with the United States and support for the mujahideen resistance against the Soviets in Afghanistan.

After graduating from the Delhi University with a BA degree in economics, Zia saw action in World War II as a British Indian Army officer, before opting for Pakistan in 1947 and fighting in the war against India in 1965. In 1970, he led the Pakistani training mission in Jordan, proving instrumental to putting down the Black September insurgency against King Hussein. In recognition, Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto approved Zia's appointment to four-star tier, as Chief of Army Staff in 1976, over several senior officers. Following increasing civil disorder, Zia deposed Bhutto and declared martial law over the country in 1977. Bhutto was controversially tried and executed by the Supreme Court less than two years later, for authorizing the murder of a political opponent.

Assuming the presidency in 1978, Zia played a major role in the Soviet war in neighboring Afghanistan while playing an ambiguous role, in favor of Iran, during the Iran–Iraq War . Aided by the United States and Saudi Arabia, Zia systematically coordinated the Afghan mujahideen against the Soviet occupation throughout the 1980s. This culminated in the Soviet Union's defeat and withdrawal in 1989, but also led to the proliferation of millions of refugees, with heroin and weaponry into Pakistan's frontier province. On the foreign front, Zia also bolstered ties with China, the European Union, the United States, and emphasized Pakistan's role in the Islamic world, while relations with India worsened amid the Siachen conflict and accusations that Pakistan was aiding the Khalistan movement. Domestically, Zia passed broad-ranging legislation as part of Pakistan's Islamization, acts criticized for fomenting religious intolerance. He also escalated Pakistan's atomic bomb project, and instituted industrialization and deregulation, helping Pakistan's economy become among the fastest-growing in South Asia. Averaged over Zia's rule, GDP growth was the highest in history.

After lifting martial law and holding non-partisan elections in 1985, Zia appointed Muhammad Junejo as the Prime Minister but accumulated even more presidential powers via the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution. After Junejo signed the Geneva Accords in 1988 against Zia's wishes, and called for an inquiry into the Ojhri Camp disaster, Zia dismissed Junejo's government and announced fresh elections in November 1988. But he was killed along with several of his top military officials and two American diplomats in a mysterious plane crash near Bahawalpur on 17 August 1988. To this day, Zia remains a polarizing figure in Pakistan's history, credited by some for preventing wider Soviet incursions into the region as well as economic prosperity, but decried for weakening democratic institutions and passing laws encouraging religious intolerance. With the passing of Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution of Pakistan, General Zia's name was permanently deleted from the Constitution of Pakistan.

Muhammad Yahya Khan (Politician, Pakistan)

Agha Muhammad Yahya Khan (4 February 1917 – 10 August 1980), popularly known as Yahya Khan was a four-star general and statesman who served as the third President of Pakistan from 1969 until the fall of East-Pakistan as a follow-up to Pakistan's defeat in the war with India in 1971.Serving with distinction in World War II as a British Indian Army officer, Yahya opted for Pakistan in 1947 and held critical command assignments.

After helping to conduct military infiltration against India in the 1965 war, Yahya was appointed commander-in-chief of army in 1966– a position he held until the final days of 1971 war. Amid political upheaval forced President Ayub Khan to resign in 1969, Yahya installed a military government after enforcing the martial law for the second time in Pakistan's history. After promulgating executive order to disestablishment West-Pakistan, he held the country's first nationwide free and fair general elections in 1970, which witnessed Awami League led by Mujibur Rahman gaining majority in East Pakistan. Under pressured by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto whose PPP which had won from the four provinces of Pakistan but had far fewer votes, Yahya delayed handing over power to Awami League. As civil unrest erupted all over East Pakistan, Yahya initiated military operations to quell the rebellion. With reports of genocide by the Pakistan army and their local collaborators against Bengali civilians. During the nine-month-long Bangladesh war for independence, members of the Pakistani military and supporting militias killed about 3,000,000 people.

Tensions escalated with India, which intervened on the side of the Mukti Bahini insurgency in 1971. In the resulting Indo-Pakistani war of 1971, which lasted less than two weeks, Pakistan surrendered its eastern command, with about 93,000 soldiers in East-Pakistan becoming prisoners-of-war. Following the independence of Bangladesh, powerful public demonstrations and mass rallies against Yahya in Pakistan forced him to hand over the power to Zulfikar Bhutto as well as stepping down from the post of commander-in-chief in disgrace.
Military decorations and honors were stripped from Yahya and he was placed under house arrest for most of the 1970s. With Bhutto's removal in 1977, Yahya was released by provincial administrator Fazl e Haq. He died in 1980 in Rawalpindi. He is viewed largely negatively by Pakistani historians, and is considered among the least successful of the country's leaders. He is also accused to be inept, womanizer and alcoholic.

Muhammad Ayub Khan (Politician, Pakistan)

Muhammad Ayub Khan (14 May 1907 –19 April 1974), widely known as Ayub Khan, was the President of Pakistan from 1958 to 1969. Ayub Khan assumed power through the 1958 Pakistani coup d'état, becoming the country's first Chief Martial Law Administrator. He resigned in 1969.

Trained at Sandhurst, Khan fought in World War II as an officer in the British Indian Army. He joined the armed forces of the newly formed state of Pakistan upon independence in 1947, and became its chief military commander in East Bengal. He was appointed as the first native Commander-in-Chief of the Pakistan Army in 1951 by the then-Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan, in a controversial promotion over several senior officers. President Iskander Mirza's decision to declare martial law in 1958 was supported by Ayub, whom Mirza declared chief martial law administrator. Two weeks later, Ayub deposed Mirza in a bloodless coup and assumed the presidency. He relinquished the post of army chief to General Musa Khan the same year.

Ayub continued his predecessors' policy of an alliance with the United States during the Cold War, joining CENTO, and allowing the U.S. and Britain access to facilities inside Pakistan, most notably the airbase outside of Peshawar, from which U-2 intelligence flights over the Soviet Union were launched. He also strengthened military ties with neighboring China, while relations deteriorated with the Soviet Union and India. There was the five-week war in 1965 with India, ending in a United Nations-mandated ceasefire. Domestically, Ayub embraced private-sector industrialization and free-market principles, making the country one of Asia's fastest-growing economies. He built several infrastructure projects, including canals, dams and power stations, began Pakistan's space program, and gave less priority to nuclear deterrence.

After defeating Fatima Jinnah in the controversial presidential elections of 1965, Ayub's standing began to slide amid allegations of widespread vote rigging. Proceeding with a peace agreement with India to end the war, many Pakistanis considered an embarrassing compromise and demonstrations across the country over rising prices, including those led by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, increased dramatically from 1967 on-wards. In 1969, Ayub resigned and handed over power to General Yahya Khan, who declared martial law for the second time. Following ill health, Ayub died in 1974. His legacy remains mixed; he is credited with economic prosperity and what supporters dub "the decade of development", but is criticized for beginning the first of the army's incursions into civilian politics, and policies that later led to the creation of Bangladesh.

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Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto (Politician, Pakistan)

Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto; 5 January 1928 – 4 April 1979) was the ninth Prime Minister of Pakistan (1973–77) and its fourth President (1971–73). Revered as Quaid-i-Awam, he founded the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) and served as its chairman until his execution in 1979.

Educated at USC, UC Berkeley and Oxford, Bhutto trained as a barrister at Lincoln's Inn in London. His political career began as a member of President Iskander Mirza's cabinet, before being assigned several ministries during the presidency of Field Marsha lAyub Khan from 1958. Appointed as Foreign Minister in 1963, Bhutto was a proponent of covert infiltration in Indian Kashmir, leading to war with India in 1965. An agreement brokered by the Soviet Union ended hostilities, but Bhutto fell out with Ayub and was dismissed from the government. After uniting the left-wing mass, Bhutto founded the PPP in 1967, and contested 1970 general election held by President Yahya Khan– Ayub's successor. The East Pakistani party, the Awami League, surprisingly won a plurality of seats, but neither Yahya nor Bhutto were ready to cede power to them. Subsequent uprisings led to the 1971 secession of the East as Bangladesh, as Pakistan were defeated in a war against Bangladesh-allied India. Bhutto was handed thepresidency in December 1971 and an emergency was imposed.

By July 1972, President Bhutto had recovered around 93,000 prisoners of war and 5,000 square miles of Indian-held territory after signing the Simla Agreement with Indian premier Indira Gandhi. In foreign affairs, he strengthened ties with Soviet Union, China and Saudi Arabia, and recognized the sovereignty of Bangladesh. Domestically, Bhutto's reign saw parliament unanimously approve a new constitution in 1973, after which he endorsed Fazal Ilahi's bid for president, and assumed instead the newly empowered office of Prime minister. He also played an integral role in initiating the atomic–bomb program. His economic program was based on the nationalization of much of Pakistan's fledgling industries, healthcare, and educational institutions; this led to severe economic stagnation. In an attempt to restore peace, Bhutto dissolved the Balochistan Assembly which was met with unrest; Bhutto subsequently ordered a military operation in the province in 1973, causing thousands of civilian casualties.

Despite civil disorder, aggravated by incidents of repression by federal forces, the PPP won the 1977 parliamentary elections easily. However, a conservative alliance alleged widespread rigging, and violence escalated across Pakistan. Finally on 5 July 1977, chief of army staff General Zia-ul-Haq deposed Bhutto in a bloodless coup, and had the former Prime Minister controversially tried and executed by the Supreme Court in 1979 for authorizing the murder of a political opponent. While Bhutto's legacy is contentious, his party, the PPP, remains one of the largest in Pakistan and continues to be dominated by members of his family.

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