Makhtar Diop occupies one of the most powerful positions in global development finance. As Managing Director and Executive Vice President of the International Finance Corporation, the World Bank Group’s private-sector arm, he is the first African to lead the institution, directing a mission to mobilise private capital for the developing world’s most pressing needs. Under his leadership, IFC reached a record $56 billion in investments in the 2024 financial year. A Senegalese economist born in Dakar in 1960, Diop brings to the role a career that spans government, the IMF and three decades at the World Bank. He served as Senegal’s Minister of Economy and Finance in 2000–01, where he restructured the customs and treasury departments and launched the country’s first sovereign credit rating. After an early spell as an economist at the International Monetary Fund, he joined the World Bank, rising to Country Director for Brazil and then to two of its most consequential posts: Vice President for Africa, overseeing some $70 billion in funding across the continent, and Vice President for Infrastructure.
Educated at the universities of Warwick and Nottingham, Diop has been named among the most influential Africans and made a Commander of Senegal’s National Order of the Lion. A jazz enthusiast and three-time national karate champion, he pairs formidable institutional experience with a conviction that private investment, well directed, can transform African economies.
