As well as wielding immense amounts of political power, many world leaders are also extremely wealthy. But a list of the richest leaders doesn't just feature the presidents and prime ministers of the world's wealthiest countries, it also includes the heads of some of the world's poorest nations. And the release of the Pandora Papers has shone a light again on how some leaders have made their money. From India's Narendra Modi to Russia's Vladimir Putin, read on to find out who the world's richest leaders are today and how they amassed their wealth. All dollar values in US dollars unless otherwise stated.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky and his family's fortune was estimated to only be $1.5 million when he was inaugurated in May 2019. Prior to serving as the country's sixth president, Mr Zelensky was a noted actor, comedian and producer. Indeed he was best known for starring in a satirical TV series Servant of the People, in which he played a history teacher who accidentally becomes the Ukrainian president. The Pandora Papers have revealed that Zelensky founded a network of offshore companies back in 2012, two of which were used to buy expensive properties in London. One of the president's advisors has defended this, claiming the offshore companies were created to "protect" Zelensky's funds from then-president Viktor Yanukovych, who was overthrown during the Ukrainian Revolution in 2014.
Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro may have one of the lowest salaries of any South American leader but is still estimated to have a fortune of around $2 million. Presiding over a country crippled by hyperinflation, food and medicine shortages, and power cuts, the socialist leader was widely criticized after being pictured enjoying a banquet dinner in Istanbul, while many of his country's citizens couldn't afford to buy meat.
Venezuela's cash supply has now fallen below $1 billion according to Bloomberg. Although the nation possesses 161.2 metric tons of gold, it hasn't been able to sell it as the Bank of England, which holds around a third of its gold reserves, refused Venezuela access amid US sanctions against the South American country. The UK courts have upheld the decision.
Prayuth Chan-ocha was a military leader who became prime minister of Thailand in 2014 after leading a successful coup. That year, figures released by the country's anti-corruption agency showed he had assets of more than $3.1 million, including a 2011 Mercedes-Benz S600L, a 2009 BMW 700Li, three Rolex watches and more than a dozen handguns. According to The Phuket News, the prime minister said he could justify his personal wealth and had nothing to hide.
It's estimated that outgoing British prime minister Boris Johnson is worth about $4 million. The UK's leader recently sold his former marital home that he shared with ex-wife Marina Wheeler for $4.8 million and bought a $1.5 million townhouse in south London with current wife Carrie Symonds. The couple came under fire in May 2021 for their extensive Downing Street renovations, which were thought to cost up to $272,000. The year before he became PM in July 2019, Johnson earned $1.1 million according to investment house AJ Bell, which included a reported $357,000 a year as a columnist for newspaper The Daily Telegraph. Now he takes home a total salary of $219,000, made up of $105,000 for the role of prime minister, alongside his Parliamentary salary of $114,000.
Following Joe Biden's financial disclosures, his wealth has been estimated at $8 million. Some people have asked why it isn't higher, considering Biden was worth $2.5 million in 2016, before earning $11.1 million in 2017, $4.6 million in 2018, $1 million in 2019, and $630,000 in 2020. Forbes has suggested that even with tax, which would have reached $7 million, charity donations totaling $1.3 million, reported household costs of $180,000, and mortgage interest reaching $80,000, his net worth should be higher. But Biden may have given money to his family or simply spent it.
Canadian PM Justin Trudeau was born into a wealthy political family, with his own father Pierre having served in the top job between from 1968 to 1979 and again between 1980 and 1984. In addition to his annual salary of CA$365,200 ($296k), Trudeau also has an inheritance from his father, which in 2013 was estimated to be about $1.2 million in cash and investments. Before his time in public office, Trudeau also made $450,000 a year from his public speaking business. His overall net worth has been estimated at $13 million.
After a stint in a media role, French president Emmanuel Macron became an investment banker for Rothschild & Cie Banque in 2008. Two years later he entered politics, working on the staff of President François Hollande. He then leaned heavily on his banking money when he took the decision to set up his own political party to run for the role of president. It paid off and he was elected in 2017. He now earns $220,500 a year. Reports vary as to his net worth, but Spear's estimates it at $31.5 million.
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan served as mayor of Istanbul and Turkey's prime minister before being elected as the country's president in 2014. Supporters say he has improved the Turkish economy, while others accuse him of corruption and autocratic tendencies. In 2018, his net worth was reported to be $58 million, but more recent estimates place it at $50 million. Erdoğan was mentioned indirectly in the Pandora Papers, which revealed that the construction company that built a controversial 1,150-room presidential palace in 2014 has been using offshore companies to avoid tax.
Singapore's head of government Lee Hsien Loong earns an annual salary of $1.6 million, making him the highest-paid world leader. In fact, his salary is so high that it is 20 times the country's GDP per capita and 12 times what Russian president Vladimir Putin earns, according to USA Today. He is also chair of sovereign wealth fund GIC Private Limited, which has estimated assets under management of about $488 billion. His net worth is estimated at $51 million.
Cyril Ramaphosa has an annual salary of around $200,000 for his role as South African president, which is 20 times higher than the $10,872 average household income of his people, according to USA Today. South Africa has recently seen more civil unrest due to unemployment and a stagnating economy. The government responded by announcing salary cuts for MPs, but the country's 2019 budget actually saw an increase in salary for Ramaphosa. He stepped down as chairman of investment group Shanduka Group in 2015 to avoid a conflict of interest and completed the sale of his stake a year later. In 2015, Forbes estimated his net worth to be $450 million.
Paul Kagame has been president of Rwanda since 2000, after he led rebel forces to end the Rwandan genocide that saw more than a million people murdered. Kagame has been key to the African country's economic rehabilitation, which earned it the moniker of being the "Singapore of Africa", although this has been matched by an intolerance for dissent. In 2012 it was reported that Kagame and the Rwandan Patriotic Front are controlling the country’s economy through a holding company called Crystal Ventures, a group that has assets of $500 million across everything from private jets to the country’s biggest milk processor. It has been estimated that Kagame, who is the chairman of Crystal Ventures, is worth $500 million.
Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta has an estimated net worth of $500 million. He is the title holder of at least 500,000 acres of prime farmland in his home country, which he inherited from his father Jomo Kenyatta, the first leader of Kenya. Kenyatta also has a large stake in Kenya's leading dairy company as well as shares in a commercial bank and TV station. But not all of his endeavors are based in Kenya: the Pandora Papers have linked the president, and six other members of his family, to as many as 13 offshore companies.
Azerbaijan's Ilham Aliyev's official annual salary is reportedly along the lines of $230,000 but his family are known to have large property assets abroad and his net worth is said to be $500 million. In 2010, his then-12-year-old son Heydar was reported to have purchased nine waterfront mansions in Dubai worth some $44 million, a figure which the average Azerbaijan citizen would have to work 10,000 years to accrue. His daughter is also known to have extensive assets. The Aliyevs hit the headlines again when the Pandora Papers revealed that the British royal family's Crown Estate bought a $91 million London property from them. The Aliyev government has been accused of corruption.
Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo has been president of oil-rich Equatorial Guinea since 1979, when he ousted his uncle Francisco Macías Nguema in a military coup. Forbes has estimated his wealth at $600 million and he is said to have several homes in South Africa, and an estate in Malibu, California. A taste for luxury seems to run in the family: in 2016 his son Teodoro 'Teodorin' Nguema Obiang (and the country's vice president) saw his fleet of 26 luxury cars including seven Ferraris, five Bentleys, three Lamorghinis, a Maserati, a McLaren and a Bugatti Veyron seized by Swiss authorities as part of a corruption probe. The fleet was sold at a charity auction in 2019 for $27 million.
Gabon's president Ali Bongo Ondimba is said to be worth a cool $1 billion, despite reportedly only making $65,000 a year. Rights groups in the country have long accused Ondimba of looting the country of its oil and natural resources to create his fortune. In 2009, Transparency International filed a case against his family and the ensuing corruption enquiry discovered assets including 39 properties in France and nine luxury cars, but the case was dropped in 2017. A year later, it was reported that he spent $111 million on a 14-bedroom mansion in Paris. The president has suffered health issues in recent years, and in January 2019 it was reported that a group of five soldiers tried to overthrow him in a bid to "restore democracy". They were unsuccessful. Ondimba has hit the headlines again as the Pandora Papers exposed the president used to run two shell companies in the British Virgin Islands.
In 2012, Syria's leader Bashar al-Assad was estimated to have amassed a fortune of around $1.5 billion, despite moves to freeze his assets in the UK, the US and Switzerland. Prior to the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War in 2011, the Assads and their friends are said to have owned between 60% and 70% of the country's assets, including land, energy plants, and factories. Some estimates suggest he could be worth as much as $5 billion today
Xi Jinping may hold the distinguished titles of general secretary of the Communist Party of China, president of the People’s Republic of China, and chairman of the Central Military Commission, but he has a very modest salary at just $22,000 per year. However, it was revealed in 2012 that Jinping and his family have hidden investments in multiple holding companies, including a $244 million share of property investment firm Shenzen Yuanwei. Jinping is said to have a net worth of $1.5 billion according to Spear's.
Sebastian Piñera served as Chilean president between 2010 and 2014 and then started another four-year term in 2018. Forbes has estimated that the Piñera family's net worth is $2.9 billion, after making a fortune by founding the credit card company Bancard in 1976. After the 2010 election, he also offloaded his 26% stake in Chilean airline LAN and sold TV channel Chilevision to Time Warner for a reported $150 million. Another world leader exposed in the Pandora Papers, Piñera has been accused of selling a sensitive copper and iron mine to a childhood friend.
Czech president Andrej Babiš was an agricultural magnate prior to winning office in 2017 and has an estimated net worth of $3.4 billion, according to Forbes. Often known as the 'Czech Donald Trump', Babiš has styled himself as a self-made businessman who is fed up with corruption in politics. But in 2019, thousands of Czechs took to the streets to call for his resignation due to alleged conflicts of interest involving his former business and a criminal inquiry into fraud relating to EU subsidies. In June 2021, the issue came to a head after Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) voted to commence proceedings against Babiš for a potential breach of EU law involving an alleged conflict of interest in Agrofert, the agriculture conglomerate he founded. According to the Pandora Papers, Babiš failed to declare that he'd used an offshore investment company to buy two villas worth $16.3 million in the south of France.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un is thought to have amassed a net worth of $5 billion since 2013. Around then, US and South Korean officials discovered the assets and bank accounts controlled by the supreme leader and his family, finding that much of his wealth is stashed away in over 200 bank accounts held in China and other countries including Austria, Luxembourg, Russia and Switzerland.
The finances of Russian president Vladimir Putin are shrouded in mystery, but an estimate by former Hermitage Capital Management CEO Bill Browder, given under oath to the US Senate Judiciary Committee in 2017, put the former KGB officer's net worth at a huge $200 billion. That's considerably higher than the net wealth of the world's richest person, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. However, in 2018 the Central Election Commission of the Russian Federation said that Putin had officially only earned $673,000 between 2011 and 2016. It also revealed he had an apartment in St Petersburg and 230 shares in Bank St Petersburg.
A video created by opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who is currently imprisoned in Russia, in January 2021 features an opulent palace by the Black Sea that was allegedly financed by billionaires close to the President as a "bribe". Navalny also alleges that Putin is obsessed by money and plotted to steal the nation's wealth. Putin denied that the palace belonged to him and described the video as a "compilation and montage". The Pandora Papers have linked the financial affairs of his inner circle to secretive business operations in Monaco, which has reportedly become "Moscow-on-sea" for wealthy Russians keen to avoid tax. These include Svetlana Krivonogikh, Putin's alleged mistress, who has apparently amassed a secret $100 million fortune. Russian spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the claims in the Pandora Papers were "unsubstantiated".
Given all this, it's unclear how much Western sanctions have directly impacted Putin's wealth since the invasion of Ukraine, and whether they are an effective method of trying to force him to end military action,
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