Timeline:Patrick Bartholemew Ahern was born on September 12th, 1951 in Drumcondra - the area in the Dublin Central constituency which would later become the centre of his political heartland.
He was educated at St Aidan's CBS, Whitehall, and later trained at the Dublin College of Commerce, Rathmines and at UCD.
He joined Fianna Fáil at the age of 17 and was first elected to the Dáil as a Fianna Fáil TD for Dublin-Finglas in the 1977 General Election. He was elected in every subsequent election when the constituency was redrafted and named Dublin Central.
Following the collapse of the Fine Gael-Labour coalition in February 1982, Mr Ahern was appointed Government Chief Whip.
The Fianna Fáil government fell nine months later after losing the support of the Workers Party and a number of Independents over proposed budgetary cutbacks and Mr Ahern spent the subsequent years as opposition spokesman on Labour.
He was a member of the Dublin City Council from 1979 to 1991 and served as Lord Mayor of Dublin in 1986.
Mr Ahern was appointed Minister for Labour in Charles Haughey's Cabinet in 1987, a post he held until he became Minister for Finance in 1991.
He was vice-president of Fianna Fáil from 1983 to 1994 and served as chairman of the party's Constituency and Organisation Committee from 1987 to 1992.
In 1989 he negotiated the terms of the Fianna Fáil/Progressive Democrat coalition Government and the Fianna Fáil/Labour coalition in 1993.
Following the resignation of Charles Haughey in 1992, Mr Ahern refused to enter the leadership contest and was retained the finance post in Albert Reynolds' government. He succeeded Mr Reynolds as the sixth leader of Fianna Fáil on November 17th, 1994.
The collapse of the FF-Labour coalition that year saw Mr Ahern despatched to the opposition benches where he remained leader of the Opposition until his election at 45 years of age as the youngest ever Taoiseach on June 26th, 1997.
Mr Ahern went on to lead Fianna Fáil into coalition governments in 2002 and 2007.