Humza Yousaf

Birth Name: Humza Haroon Yousaf

Place of Birth: Rutherglen, South Lanarkshire, Scotland

Date of Birth: 7 April, 1985

Ethnicity: Punjabi Pakistani

Humza Yousaf is a Scottish politician. He has been First Minister of Scotland, from 29 March, 2023 to 7 May, 2024, and Leader of the Scottish National Party, from 27 March, 2023 to 6 May, 2024. He has also been a Member of the Scottish Parliament for Glasgow, then Glasgow Pollok, since 5 May, 2011; as well as, a Minister for Europe and International Development, from 6 September, 2012 to 18 May, 2016, Minister for Transport and the Islands, from 18 May, 2016 to 26 June, 2018, Cabinet Secretary for Justice, from 26 June, 2018 to 20 May, 2021, and Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care, from 20 May, 2021 to 28 March, 2023. He introduced the Hate Crime and Public Order Act 2021 to the Scottish parliament, and handled the NHS’s recovery and wide roll-out of its 2021 vaccination programme in Scotland. For a time when Humza was First Minister of Scotland, the leaders of Ireland and England/the U.K., Leo Varadkar and Rishi Sunak, respectively, were also of Indian origin.

He is the son of Pakistani parents, Shaaista Bhutta and Mian Muzaffar Yousaf Arain, an accountant. His father was born in Mian Channu, Punjab, Pakistan, and moved to Scotland in the 1960s. His mother was born in Nairobi, Kenya, to a family of Pakistani Punjabi descent.

Humza is a Muslim. He is married to psychotherapist, political activist, and politician Nadia El-Nakla, with whom he has a daughter. Nadia is the daughter of a Palestinian father and a Scottish mother from Dundee.