The chairman of the liberal Wafd Party, El-Sayed El-Badawi, who is considering a candidacy in Egypt's 2018 presidential elections was born in 1950 in the city of Tanta in the central Nile Delta.

He graduated from the Faculty of Pharmacy at the University of Alexandria in 1973.

El-Badawi joined the Wafd Party in 1983.

He was elected to a number of top posts in the party and represented Wafd in parliament before becoming the party's chairman in 2010.

Founded during the 1919 revolution against the British occupation, the Wafd is the country's oldest political party. 

Wafd played a central role in mobilizing for Egyptian independence in the period between 1919 and 1952.

In 1953, the party was dissolved - along with other political parties - by the late President Gamal Abdel-Nasser following the 1952 revolution.

However, in 1978, under the late President Anwar Sadat, the party was allowed back into political life, reconstituting itself as the New Wafd Party.

The reconstituted party participated in a number of parliamentary elections during the 30-year tenure of former President Hosni Mubarak, including the last parliament polls under Mubarak's in October 2010.

In the years following the 2011 ouster of Mubarak, the party took part in the two parliamentary elections that were held, securing dozens of seats.

In 2013, following the ouster of Islamist President Mohamed Morsi, El-Badawi represented the party in the 50-member committee which drafted Egypt's new constitution.

Wafd currently holds the third largest number of seats in Egypt's parliament, 46, after the Free Egyptians Party and the Future of a Homeland party.

El-Badawi is a wealthy businessman with large investments in the pharmaceutical industry and in Egyptian television. He is the founder and the CEO of Sigma Pharmaceuticals and Al-Hayat TV channels.