Word: shakhbout
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
While Premier Abdel Rahman Bazzaz was getting the heave-ho in Iraq, the Middle East's tiny, oil-soaked sheikdom of Abu Dhabi was going through a similar-though less surprising-upheaval. Sheik Shakhbout bin Sultan, 61, who had been in power longer (since 1928) than any other Middle East ruler, was suddenly shipped off to nearby Bahrain Island one day last week, and his youngest brother, 46-year-old Sheik Zaid bin Sultan, became the sheikdom's new headman...
...seven British-protected Trucial States that cradle the Persian Gulf, Abu Dhabi is the fourth largest oil producer in the Gulf; this year it expects to earn $70 million in oil revenues, which by 1970 are likely to reach an annual $125 million. Yet under Shakhbout, Abu Dhabi's 20,000 people seldom saw a cent of the riches...
When the money first started gushing in four years ago, Shakhbout stashed it under his bed in his threadbare mud-walled palace. When his bedsprings began bulging, he transferred his fortune to gasoline cans in the palace dungeon. Not until the cans rotted from the humidity and rats began nibbling at his millions did Shakhbout finally switch his hoard to two Abu Dhabi banks...
Foreign contractors and advisers proposed roads, schools, power plants, harbors and sewage systems. Shakhbout always refused. In one rare moment of weakness, he agreed to build a modern hospital, then later refused to equip it. Merchants who called on the sheik to ask payment of long-standing debts were thrown out of the palace. When Shakhbout's 600-man police force protested about overdue pay, he fired half the force...
...years, Zaid tried to persuade his older brother to spread the oil wealth around the country. Running out of patience, Zaid finally called a secret family council, and all agreed that Shakhbout had to go. The British obligingly brought in native troops from neighboring sheikdoms, carried the reluctant Shakhbout bodily out of the palace, and flew him to Bahrain in a waiting R.A.F. plane. "Our priorities are many," Zaid said at week's end. "We need a deep-water port, an international airport, hospitals, schools and town planning, plus some parks for the people. From now on, the people...
| 1 |