Abbas: the quiet man in the business suit

MAHMOUD Abbas could hardly be more different from the man he seeks to replace: unlike Yasser Arafat, he likes to work in the shadows, shuns publicity, listens to advisers, deplores violence.

He is the quiet man in the business suit who stood for 40 years by the side of the flamboyant revolutionary in military fatigues and keffiye, whispering pragmatic advice into the ear of the stubborn ideologue.

But Abbas can be just as tough as Arafat on the core issues of the Palestinians’ future.

Abbas, 69, commonly called Abu Mazen, was elected chief of the Palestine Liberation Organisation yesterday, hours after Arafat died in a Paris hospital.

Officials say the unanimous vote by the PLO executive put him on track to be popularly elected president of the Palestinian government after a 60-day transition.

In 2003, when Arafat was compelled under international pressure to create a Palestinian government, Abbas was his first choice for prime minister.

But the two men quarrelled and Abbas walked out four months later.

Abbas helped found the PLO in 1964 and joined the PLO executive committee in 1980, rising to the position of secretary-general.

He is married and has two sons, both of whom are businessmen.