Ahmad Muhammad Numan (Arabic: أحمد محمد نعمان; 26 April 1909 – 27 September 1996) was a Yemeni educator, propagandist and politician.

Numan was a descendant of a family of important shaykhs in al-Hujariyya,[1] a province in the southern highlands southeast of the department of Ta'izz.

After his father's death in 1934, Numan assumed the role of head of household, in which capacity he gained the respect of fellow villagers and came into contact with local officials.

After the Imam's defeat in the border war with Saudi Arabia al-Muta had formed the secret Hay'at al Nidal (the Committee of the Struggle") to resist a conservative backlash.

[11] Numan's original goal was to attend King Fuad I University but was refused admission because he lacked qualifications in modern subjects.

Instead Numan reluctantly attended al-Azhar University, which he feared would simply duplicate the Islamic education he received at Zabid.

The university was a center of Muslim Brotherhood activity, who were particularly interested in Yemen, owing to its isolation, as a suitable test for governance according to shari'a.

[12] At al-Azhar Numan made the acquaintance of Ali al-Tahir, a Palestinian newspaper publisher in Cairo.

At the time he was shocked by the backwardness of Yemen, and persuaded the Imam to employ advisers (from the same Lebanese Druze community that he came from.

[15] Although the poet had no background in reform politics or anti-imamic agitation and spent his first few months in Cairo writing poetry and reading at Dar al-Ulum University, he was gradually drawn into the orb of Yemeni dissidents.

In mid-1940 al-Zubayri and Numan formed al-Katiba al-Ula (the "First Battalion"), a discussion group focusing on plans for reform of Yemen.

[17] Numan remained in contact with al-Zubayri, who continued the meetings of al-Katiba, changing its name, however, to Shabab al-Amr, based on the title of the reform manifesto he was writing: al-Barnamij al-Awwal min Baramij Shabab al-Amr bi'l-Ma'ruf wa 'l-Nahi 'an al-Mankur ("The First Programme of the Youths for Promoting the Good and Preventing the Bad"), a title based on the Quranic expression suggesting government by the ummah.

[17] Before his arrival al-Zubayri had consulted with Ahmad al Muta and several associates in Sana'a and had written to Numan of his plan to present the Barnamij to the Imam.

Numan counsel him against doing so on the ground that public support had not been sufficiently organized to risk a confrontation with the Imam.