Hassanal Bolkiah

• 1. Introduction

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  Hassanal Bolkiah, the sultan of Brunei, has held his throne since 1967. That makes him the longest-reigning current monarch and the longest-serving current head of state anywhere in the world. He is also counted among the few absolute monarchs still ruling today. As of 2023, his net worth was said to be 50 billion dollars, which places him among the wealthiest people on earth.

  Such a reign raises questions. How does a young military cadet inherit a throne, and what does a small kingdom do when its British protector wants to leave? What happens when a royal family's money and a state's money are hard to tell apart? And why did some of his decisions bring boycotts to his hotels and send honorary degrees back to the universities that granted them? The answers begin in a schoolroom inside a palace.

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• 2. Prince And Cadet

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  Pengiran Muda Hassanal Bolkiah was born on the 15th of July 1946 in Istana Darussalam. His uncle, Sultan Ahmad Tajuddin, was on the throne at the time. The boy's father held the title of heir presumptive, which made him second in line. Hassanal grew up with three brothers, Mohamed, Sufri and Jefri, and six sisters.

  His lessons began at the Istana Darul Hana Surau in the latter part of 1955 and ended in the first week of 1959. Abdul Ghani bin Jamil, interviewed about those years, said the pupils were aged five to ten and Hassanal Bolkiah was the oldest by far. In 1955, at the age of nine, he had finished third grade at the Jamalul Alam Malay School in Brunei Town. Within three months he could read English literature. After four years he had reached the sixth grade of primary schooling, and he leaned toward science, languages and history.

  In January 1961 he entered Victoria Institution in Kuala Lumpur, after a first stop at Jalan Gurney School. He stayed until December 1963. That made him the first Sultan of Brunei to be schooled both at home and abroad. The headmaster, V. Murugasu, later said he showed the marks of a responsible leader even as a student. In the Cadet Corps he was named best recruit in 1961. The principal, G. E. D. Lewis, stressed that other royals and nobles attended the school, so the prize rested on merit alone. He left with the rank of Lance Corporal.

  Politics soon intruded on his studies. On the 14th of July 1961, at fifteen, he was invested as Crown Prince. In December 1962 a revolt broke out in Brunei, and the 2nd Gurkha Rifles were sent in that same month. Lieutenant Colonel Digby Willoughby and a small squad of Royal Gurkha Rifles helped rescue the prince and his father from their palace. His father remained deeply grateful to Willoughby. In 1963, with relations between Brunei and Malaysia strained, the prince came home to finish at Sultan Omar Ali Saifuddien College.

  On the 29th of July 1965 he married Pengiran Anak Saleha in the palace. On the 4th of January 1966 he enrolled as a cadet officer at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. His courses covered English, mathematics, science, military science and international affairs, with special attention to Russia. The training stressed self-discipline and responsibility. His commission as an Honorary Captain in the Coldstream Guards came on the 1st of March 1968, after he was already sultan.

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• 3. Crown And Chariot

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  On the evening of the 4th of October 1967, Sultan Omar Ali Saifuddien III announced that he was abdicating. His son, then 21, returned from England at once to take over his father's duties. That night, Pengiran Pemancha Anak Haji Mohamed Alam, the Chief of Adat Istiadat Negara, read the news to the country over Radio Brunei.

  The proclamation came at 3:00 p.m. on the 5th of October 1967, in a public ceremony in the Balai Singgahsana of Istana Darul Hana. There he was named Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah Muiz'zaddin Wad'daulah, the 29th Sultan of Brunei. The Wazir, the Cheteria, the Acting Menteri Besar and members of the Legislative Council attended. The Acting Menteri Besar pledged a loyalty that would not waver, matching what had been given to the sultan's father. In his first speech from that hall, the new ruler promised to "carry out the policies of my dear father".

  Planning for the coronation, called the Perpuspaan, began at a meeting of nobles and high officials six months before the date. On the 8th of January 1968, at 8:15 pm, the Acting Menteri Besar told listeners of Radio Brunei that the ceremony would take place on the 1st of August 1968. On the 1st of February, two parties climbed Bukit Sungai Kebun and Bukit Panggal. A red flag went up on the first hill and a yellow flag on the second. By Bruneian tradition, a coronation begins with those two flags.

  On the day itself, thousands of residents and visitors crowded the vantage points in Pusat Bandar. The sultan arrived in a brand-new six-door Mercedes-Benz 600 Pullman Landaulet, with its rear roof lowered so that people could see him. A 21-gun salute had already sounded. At the fire station he boarded the Usongan Diraja, the Royal Chariot, wearing red and gold. The chariot carried a tiger skin throne. Its body was made of 26 carved wooden panels decorated with 24-carat gold leaf and precious diamonds. It stretched about 85 feet, and fifty black-clad soldiers of the Royal Brunei Malay Regiment drove it.

  Inside the new Lapau, his father placed the crown on his head and handed him the Keris si-Naga, the symbol of supreme royal power. The elder man then removed his ceremonial sabre and swore loyalty to his son as head of state and religion. The new sultan's brothers and the senior nobles did the same. The sultan vowed to keep the peace, raise living standards through development projects, and uphold Islam and Brunei's customs. Lee Kuan Yew, Tunku Abdul Rahman and the British High Commissioner Arthur Adair, who represented Queen Elizabeth II, watched. A Japanese film company hired by the Coronation Committee recorded everything in colour, and prints went abroad in 35 mm and 16 mm.

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• 4. Bargaining For Independence

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  In January 1968 the British minister Malcolm MacDonald visited Brunei, and in April 1968 George Thomson followed. Both heard the young sultan and his father voice the same fear. They worried about what a British military withdrawal from the Far East would mean for the country's security. London wanted Brunei to become an independent parliamentary democracy. The two men preferred to keep the monarchy and felt the country was not ready to stand without British protection.

  The sultan's own position was strong on paper. Under the 1959 Constitution he was head of state with full executive authority, and an emergency proclamation in force since the 1962 revolt strengthened that power. Because of his youth and inexperience, he still took advice from his father on every major decision.

  From the 19th of September to the 26th of October 1968, a delegation he led negotiated in London. The talks centred on the stationing of Gurkha troops and on the 1959 Agreement, whose security clause and British control of foreign affairs were due to expire in November 1970. The first round changed no British minds, but he stayed hopeful. Between May and December 1969 he made three more trips to London without success. On the 14th of November 1969 he returned with Prince Mohamed Bolkiah to meet Malcolm Shepherd and Michael Stewart, yet the Labour government held to its plan to hand over sovereignty.

  Another trip in April 1970 failed too, because Britain thought Brunei could defend itself. The sultan answered with alarm: "even if half the male population were to join the Armed Forces, Brunei would not be able to defend itself." The election of a Conservative government shifted the mood. Britain agreed to keep a limited presence in Southeast Asia, including Gurkha troops in Brunei, and did not renounce the 1959 Agreement. Talks with Anthony Royle in November 1970 produced the Brunei-British Friendship Agreement, signed on the 23rd of November 1971. It gave Brunei full internal independence and confined the British High Commissioner to foreign affairs.

  In July 1971, aged 25, he was named Inspector-General of the Royal Brunei Police Force and General of the Royal Brunei Malay Regiment. Colonel John Simpson, the regiment's commander, called it a noteworthy distinction that tied the army closer to the royal family.

  He led yet another mission to London in 1978. It produced the Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation, which took effect on the 1st of January 1984 and ended British responsibility for Brunei's foreign affairs and defence. At midnight he recited the Declaration of Independence, announcing that Brunei would "resume full international responsibility as a sovereign and independent nation". He took the posts of Prime Minister, Minister of Home Affairs and Minister of Finance, and declared Melayu Islam Beraja the national philosophy. It rests on the royal family, Malay cultural values and Islamic teaching. On the 23rd of February 1984 he presided over the country's first National Day celebrations.

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• 5. Jubilee Spectacle

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  In 1992 Brunei spent an estimated 200 million dollars to mark a quarter century of the sultan's rule. The spending paid for a 6,000-seat mosque with a gold dome, 21 guest homes for visiting dignitaries and an exhibition center. It also covered 200 Mercedes-Benz cars for visitors. The Churchill Memorial Building was renamed the Royal Brunei Regalia Building that year, and a Silver Jubilee Medal was struck in gold, silver and bronze classes.

  The climax was a banquet at the Istana Nurul Iman. Guests included the Yang di-Pertuan Agong Azlan Shah of Malaysia, his consort Tuanku Bainun, Prince Edward and the Sultans of the Malaysian states. The 46-year-old sultan appeared before his people with his two wives and ten children, all dressed in yellow and glittering with jewels. He pledged to follow his late father's policies of peace, rising living standards, prosperity and the defence of Islam. He then rode a Rolls-Royce Silver Spur and a great chariot of wood and gold.

  On the 5th of October 1992 he also founded the Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah Foundation, known as Yayasan. It rests on five guiding principles: finance, development, welfare, education and religion. Its history includes an unwelcome discovery. In 2018 Prince Abdul Malik told the governors that more than 115,000 dollars had gone missing. Eight cases of breach of trust involving five employees, totalling 115,528 dollars, dated from 2004 to 2016. They came to light when the Prime Minister's Office Audit Department made the foundation's first audit since 1992.

  Education became a second channel for giving. A scholarship scheme set up in 2005, named for the Supreme Commander of the Royal Brunei Armed Forces, has sent more than fifty Bruneians to international universities and military schools. In 2006 the sultan approved the Sultan's Scholar award, which the foundation widened in 2013 to reach doctoral degrees.

  The 50th anniversary of his accession, on the 5th of October 2017, drew a crowd of 80,000 to the capital beneath low clouds. In his speech he called it the "most historic day" for himself and for Bruneians, and spoke of "reciprocal responsibility" between ruler and people. Fifty specially chosen workers pulled the royal chariot along a 5 km route, carrying the crown prince, four of his brothers and Princess Rashidah. Tens of thousands cheered "Daulat" as it passed. On the 2nd of December 2017 the Royal Regalia Building was renamed the Royal Regalia Museum in honour of the jubilee.

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• 6. The Brother's Fortune

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  In July 1998 a network of companies called the Amedeo Development Corporation collapsed under debts of about 10 billion US dollars. It belonged to Prince Jefri Bolkiah, the sultan's younger brother, and his son Pengiran Muda Abdul Hakeem ran it. Its purchases included the luxury goods company Asprey and an amusement park in Brunei.

  The collapse exposed how money had flowed out of the Brunei Investment Agency. Between 1983 and mid-1998, about 40 billion US dollars left its accounts as so-called special transfers. An independent investigation found that 14.8 billion went to accounts of Prince Jefri, 8 billion to accounts of the sultan and 3.8 billion to government purposes. The destination of the rest was never established. The investigators noted that the line between royal and state finances was blurred and secretive, so the true course of events is very hard to trace.

  The prince was accused of using state funds for his private investments and lost his post as head of the agency. In February 2000 the Bruneian government tried to freeze his overseas assets, and he countersued in New York. A settlement signed in May 2000 had terms that were never published. Under it the prince began returning more than 500 properties, about 2,500 cars, 100 paintings, five boats and nine aircraft. In 2001 ten thousand lots of his belongings went to auction. His car collection, often credited to the sultan, was in fact overseen by Jefri. Most of the cars left outside garages were beyond saving.

  The agency later claimed that the prince had not disclosed all his accounts, and it reopened the fight. The case climbed to the Privy Council in London, which Brunei can use as its highest appeal court because of its protectorate past. The Council called his claim to keep certain properties "simply incredible" and ruled for the government. Further actions in Malaysia and the Cayman Islands gave the agency control of the Hotel Bel-Air in Los Angeles and The New York Palace Hotel in Manhattan.

  In England, a contempt hearing was set for June 2008, but the prince went to Paris instead. Judge Peter Smith issued an arrest warrant. By October 2009 the prince seemed to have been allowed home. He kept his titles and place in royal protocol, and his last noted public appearance in the source was the Legislative Council opening in March 2012.

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• 7. Law And Backlash

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  On the 25th of September 2004, the Legislative Council met again, and its first task was amending the 1959 constitution. Lawmakers approved a plan to enlarge it to 45 seats, 15 of them elected. On the 1st of September 2005 the sultan dissolved the council, and it was recreated the next day under the revised constitution. He nominated five members and others were chosen indirectly through village councils. Elections had still not been scheduled by the end of 2007. Reports said that on the 9th of March 2006 he amended the constitution to make himself infallible under Bruneian law.

  In 2014 he announced strict Islamic criminal penalties, including flogging, amputation and death by stoning. They caused rare domestic opposition and international outrage. Their start date of the 22nd of April 2014 passed without explanation, leading some to suspect he hesitated. Then he declared the step "a must" in light of Islam and brushed aside what he called "never-ending theories" that the penalties were harsh. In 2015 he banned public Christmas celebrations for Muslims, including Santa hats. Cardinal Cornelius Sim reported that roughly 4,000 of 18,000 Bruneian Catholics attended mass on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day in 2015.

  The code took effect on the 3rd of April 2019, with stoning for homosexuality and adultery. Calls for boycotts targeted the Dorchester Collection, the hotel group owned through the Brunei Investment Agency. George Clooney, Elton John and Ellen DeGeneres urged people to avoid the hotels. The Gill Action Fund cancelled a donor conference at The Beverly Hills Hotel and asked for its deposit back. Designers Brian Atwood and Peter Som called on the fashion industry to join in.

  Honours began to fall away. The Royal College of General Practitioners had made him its first companion in January 2013, then withdrew the honour in April 2019. The University of Aberdeen revoked his honorary doctorate on the 17th of April 2019. Oxford received its degree back on the 6th of May 2019, and King's College London rescinded its own on the 6th of June 2019. Under this pressure, the sultan said he would extend a moratorium on capital punishment for homosexuality and ratify the United Nations Convention Against Torture.

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• 8. A Seat At The Table

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  On the 30th of September 2015, the sultan told world leaders at the United Nations that the organisation had no equivalent. Its 70 years of existence, he said, proved its significance. His own country joined the UN in September 1984, and he addressed the General Assembly on its admission. Brunei entered ASEAN that same year, and he established ties with several nations, including Singapore. Like his father, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II. He chaired the APEC leaders' summit in 2000 and the ASEAN summits of 2013 and 2021.

  Trade and travel agreements followed. Brunei and the United States signed a trade and investment framework in Washington, D.C. on the 16th of December 2002. On the 27th of December 2004 Brunei signed an open skies agreement on passenger air services. An economic partnership with Japan came on the 18th of June 2007, covering energy and human resource development.

  Singapore was a recurring partner. On a state visit on the 5th and the 6th of July 2017, his fourth, he and Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong introduced commemorative 50-dollar notes for the 50th anniversary of the Currency Interchangeability Agreement. He met China's president Xi Jinping in Bangkok on the 18th of November 2022 and visited Bahrain from the 9th to the 11th of June 2023.

  Crises also tested him. In March 2020 he restricted travel to and from Brunei because of COVID-19, and he received his vaccination on the 1st of April 2021. On the 19th of September 2022 he attended Queen Elizabeth II's state funeral at Westminster Abbey. At an ASEAN-GCC summit in October 2023, he urged the Security Council to support peace efforts in the Middle East after the Gaza war began.

  In May 2025, fatigue sent him to hospital in Kuala Lumpur while he attended an ASEAN summit. On the 18th of January 2026, he underwent a total knee replacement at the Jerudong Park Medical Centre in Brunei.

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