Tidjane Thiam

Thiam was born in the Ivory Coast (Côte d'Ivoire) on 29 July 1962. He is a descendant of two prominent families from Senegal and Ivory Coast. On his mother's side, he is a descendant of Queen Yamousso, after whom the capital of Côte d'Ivoire, Yamoussoukro, is named. Thiam's mother, Marietou, was the niece of Chief Félix Houphouët-Boigny, the founder and first President of Côte d'Ivoire.

His father, Amadou Thiam (Ivorian politician), a journalist, was born in Senegal and emigrated to Côte d'Ivoire in 1947. He supported Houphouet-Boigny in his fight for the independence of the country and served more than ten years in the Ivorian cabinet after independence.

Tidjane's uncle, Habib Thiam, was Prime Minister of Senegal for more than 10 years and also served as President of the National Assembly.

In 1982 Thiam was the first Ivorian to pass the entrance examination to the École Polytechnique in Paris. In 1984, he graduated from the École Polytechnique and in 1986 from the École Nationale Supérieure des Mines de Paris where he was top of his class. In 1986 he was offered a scholarship to study for an MBA at INSEAD and join the McKinsey Fellows Programme' in Paris. He received an MBA from INSEAD in 1988 (Dean's list). In 1989 he took a one-year sabbatical from McKinsey to participate in the World Bank's Young Professionals Program in Washington, D.C. He returned to McKinsey in 1990, working first in New York City and then in Paris.

In December 1993, the first Ivorian President, Félix Houphouët-Boigny, died and was replaced by Henri Konan Bédié. In April 1994, at the request of the new president, Thiam left France and McKinsey to go back to Abidjan and become the CEO of the National Bureau for Technical Studies and Development (BNETD), an infrastructure development and economic advisory body with more than 4,000 staff, reporting directly to the President and the Prime Minister. In that role, which had cabinet rank, he was also handling key negotiations with the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. Thiam was also a key member of the Privatization Committee, in charge of privatising extensive state-owned assets.

In August 1998, in addition to his role at the BNETD, where he became chairman, Thiam formally joined the cabinet and was appointed Minister of Planning and Development. In his years in Côte d'Ivoire, Thiam promoted private sector involvement in infrastructure development. He implemented flagship projects including the Azito power plant (nominated by the Financial Times as one of the boldest successful investment decisions in the world), the renovation of Abidjan airport and the construction of the Riviera Marcory toll bridge, whose financing was closed a few days before the 1999 coup. One of the first actions of the new president, Alassane Ouattara, in 2011 was to start the construction of that bridge as originally overseen by Thiam, with the same promoters.

Thiam actively promoted an extensive privatisation programme which saw, between 1994 and 1999, Côte d'Ivoire lead African countries by privatising its telephone, services, electric power generation, airports, railways and many companies in the agricultural sector. In 1998, the World Economic Forum in Davos named him as one of the annual 100 Global Leaders for Tomorrow, and in 1999 the Forum named him a member of the Dream Cabinet. In December 1999, whilst Thiam was abroad, the Ivorian military seized control of the government. Thiam returned to the country, where he was arrested and held for several weeks. Robert Guéï, the new head of state, offered him the position of chief of staff, but he declined and left the country in early 2000.

Tidjane was married to Annette Anthony Thiam, an African-American lawyer who used to work for Joe Biden, and they have two sons. Tidjane's eldest son Bilal Thiam died of cancer in May 2020 at the age of 24.

Tidjane and Annette separated in 2015, and divorced in 2016. He speaks English, French, and German fluently.