Trevor Manuel

Trevor Andrew Manuel (born 31 January 1956 in Cape Town ) is a South African politician of the African National Congress ( ANC). He was elected in 1994 as a government minister, first up in 1996 as trade and industry minister, then from 1996 to 2009 under three presidents as finance minister and since the inauguration of Jacob Zuma, 2009 as Chairman of the National Planning Commission of South Africa of the Presidential rank of a minister; he is also a member of the Executive Committee and the work of the ANC since 1991. Manuel is one of the most influential ministers of South Africa and as the architect of the economic boom in South Africa.

Manuel was affected as Coloured by apartheid, he grew up in a poor township of Cape Town's Cape Flats. He was politicized early and heavily influenced by the ideas of Steve Biko. In the 1970s he joined the then illegal ANC, in the 80 years he has been one of the leading figures of the opposition in Cape Town, but the second half of the decade spent mostly in prison. In 1989 he took part in the negotiations between the ANC and government through the end of apartheid in part. In 1994, Manuel Member of Parliament and Industry and Trade Minister in the government Mandela before he was Finance Minister in 1996. He is the most influential " Coloured" in the South African government and is considered a critic of the preference for "Black " by the ANC.

During his tenure as finance minister, he consolidated the South African government finances. When he resigned in solidarity with Thabo Mbeki in September 2008, which led to his price drop of 4% within a few minutes, although a re- appointment by the interim president Kgalema Motlanthe had already been decided. Internationally, he has worked before the coining of the term " BRICS " as a way to adapt the structures of the IMF and the World Bank to the growing importance of these countries the first. With the inauguration of Zuma from the left wing of the ANC hard criticized Manuel switched to the more powerful post of Head of the National Planning Commission, to which all other ministers are obliged to budget issues to account.

He was touted as a possible candidate to succeed Dominique Strauss -Kahn as managing director of the IMF in May 2011, a post which is traditionally occupied by a European. Strauss-Kahn's successor was finally his compatriot Christine Lagarde.

Manuel has since its founding in 2008 chancellor of the Cape Peninsula University of Technology in Cape Town.

He is married since 2008 with Maria Ramos, which is since 2009 CEO of Absa Bank.