In 2004 he was appointed by the council to serve as interim President of Iraq following the 28 June return of Iraqi sovereignty from the Coalition Provisional Authority.

He then went on to study in King Fahd University for Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM) for two years before completing his BSc in civil engineering in the UK.

[1][3] "My mother would take me to visit the holy shrines in Najaf and Karbala, in addition to the Sunni mosques in Baghdad and St. Mary's Church," Yawar told the Iraqi paper Al Zaman.

According to Jaffar Saheb Said, an elder at the northern Baghdad shrine of Imam Kadhem, a Shiite saint, "he's deep-rooted and well-known among Arab clans.

"[4] His uncle, Sheikh Mohsen Ajil al-Yawar, is the current head of the Shammar tribe and his grandfather played a role in guiding Iraq towards independence in the 1920s, later serving as a member of the king's parliament.

[6] During his term as interim president, leading up to the dissolution of the Governing Council, al-Yawar spoke out against the misperception that Arab Sunnis in Iraq enjoyed huge privileges under Saddam Hussein's rule.

Sheikh Ghazi's selection as interim president, at first resisted and then accepted by the American administrators in Iraq, is further recognition of the tribal revival at this time.

"[10] But to many Iraqis, Sheikh al-Yawar was part of the Governing Council, which had lost virtually all legitimacy after its inability to solve the military and political crisis that had erupted across Iraq in April.

"They occupied the country, disbanded the security agencies and for 10 months left Iraq's borders open for anyone to come in without a visa or even a passport.

"[13] In addition, Sheikh Ghazi condemned the U.S. for remaining in Saddam Hussein's former Republican Palace presidential compound and converting it to their embassy, as some reports suggested.

[14] As the Coalition-led siege in Fallujah peaked during his term as interim president, al-Yawer openly disparaged the assault that only a few months earlier led him to almost resign from the Governing Council in protest of the Coalition's actions.

He condemned the actions of the coalition forces, holding them completely accountable (according to the UN resolution) for delivering safety and aid to the Iraqi people.

[17] In the January 2006 election, he joined the Iraqi National List coalition with other secular politicians Ayad Allawi and Adnan Pachachi.

Although it was hard to find research or polling on the subject, a few Sunni commentators, such as "Riverbend" of Baghdad Burning, suggested that Ghazi al-Yawer's poor showing in the elections was largely because he was held in low esteem by common Sunni Iraqis, being called by the epithet "al Baqara al dhahika", which translates roughly as "the laughing cow".