Bidzina Ivanishvili, Georgian businessman and politician, 10th Prime Minister of Georgia
Bidzina Ivanishvili (Georgian: ბიძინა ივანიშვილი, also known as Boris Ivanishvili; born 18 February 1956) is a Georgian politician, billionaire businessman and philanthropist, who was Prime Minister of Georgia from October 2012 to November 2013.
Ivanishvili founded the Georgian Dream-Democratic Georgia party on 21 April 2012. He became the leader of the coalition of opposition parties he created, which helped him attain victory in the 2012 parliamentary elections.On 25 October 2012, he was elected as the prime minister of Georgia. On 20 November 2013, Ivanishvili voluntarily left the post of prime minister on the basis of an earlier statement and returned to the civil sector. In 2018, he returned to politics and was elected as the chairman of the Georgian Dream-Democratic Georgia party.Bidzina Ivanishvili is a citizen of Georgia, later granted by Saakashvili. In March 2010, Ivanishvili additionally attained French citizenship. In October 2011, he was deprived of his Georgian citizenship "according to Article 32 of the Georgian Law on Citizenship" (which lists grounds for loss of citizenship including "accept[ing] citizenship of another state"), shortly after he had announced his intention to form a political party to challenge Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili.In March 2012, Ivanishvili was ranked at number 153 in Forbes magazine's annual list of the world's billionaires with an estimated worth of $6.4 billion, making him Georgia's richest person.