Dr. Rifat Mahgoub was born on April 23, 1926, in Zarqa city, Damietta governorate. He received his LLB from Cairo University in 1948.

Mahjoub traveled on a scholarship to a university in Paris and was awarded a doctorate in economics and public finance in 1953. He returned to Egypt after the revolution of July 1952 and was admitted to several positions at Cairo University, including Dean of the Faculty of Economics and Political Science in 1971, The next year was chosen by the former president Mohammed Anwar Sadat for the post of minister headed by the Republic, was the beginning of several political positions imitated In 1975 was Mahjoub deputy prime minister in the presidency and then took Mahjoub the post of Speaker of the People's Assembly until his assassination in 1990.

On the morning of 12 October 1990, at 10:30 am, while his motorcade was passing by the Semarames Hotel to the Meridian Hotel, to meet the delegation of the Syrian Parliament, four young men got out on two motorcycles and shot the car with bullets. Dr. Mahjoub died immediately.

One of the most important political positions of Dr. Mahjoub is his refusal to sell the public sector and his refusal to cancel the free education and his opposition to civil or private associations, which were contrary to the general trend of the regime under the era of Mohamed Hosni Mubarak, so there was a dispute between Mahjoub and supporters of Mubarak

Al-Mahjoub won several awards and high honors, including the First Order of Sciences and Arts in 1963 from President Gamal Abdel Nasser, the First Class Medal of the Republic in 1975 from Sadat and the State Award for Social Sciences from the Supreme Council of Culture in 1980.