Egypt’s former prime minister Sherif Ismail dies at 67
- ‘I mourn with deep sorrow a virtuous man among Egypt’s best,’ President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi wrote on Facebook on Saturday
- Ismail was sworn in as PM in 2015 before resigning in 2018 as Sisi began his second presidential term, after a landslide victory
Former Egyptian prime minister Sherif Ismail, who served during President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s first term in office, died on Saturday at the age of 67.
“I mourn with deep sorrow a virtuous man among Egypt’s best, a man in whom the nation’s conscience was embodied, the former prime minister, the honourable Dr. Sherif Ismail,” the president wrote on Facebook Saturday.
Ismail was sworn in as prime minister in 2015 before resigning in 2018 as Sisi began his second presidential term, after a landslide victory against one of his supporters.
According to Sisi, Ismail “assumed responsibility in the most difficult of circumstances and the hardest of times”.
Ismail oversaw a period of tough economic reforms that in late 2016 saw a steep currency devaluation followed by subsidy cuts tied to a US$12 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).