Amar Ghoul

Institution: Agence National des Autoroutes, Algeria
Position: Public works minister

As the public works minister, Algeria’s Amar Ghoul is responsible for the region’s biggest road project – the 1,216-kilometre East-West Highway, run under the Agence National des Autoroutes division of the Public Works Ministry. Currently under construction, the link, which also requires 504km of connections, is worth about $12bn and is being built by two separate Asian consortiums in three major packages.

Ghoul has been public works minister for more than a decade, but was briefly ousted when his political party, the Movement for Society of Peace (MSP), quit the national ruling alliance in 2011. After leaving the MSP in July 2012, Ghoul was reinstated and is now president of his own party, Tadjamou Amal Jazair. Prior to being public works minister, he was the minister for fisheries and marine resources.

An engineer by background, Ghoul began training as a civil engineer in 1986 after first studying mathematics. He then specialised in mechanical and nuclear engineering, earning his first doctorate in 1991.

Website: www.ana.org.dz