The Egyptian businessman Mohamed al Fayed, former owner of the Harrods department store in London, and father of Dodi, Diana of Wales's last partner, has died at the age of 94. As fate would have it, his death, known this Saturday, occurred on August 30, the day before the 26th anniversary of the fateful car accident in Paris that killed his son, Lady Di and the driver. “His wife, children and grandchildren wish to confirm that our loving husband, father and grandfather Mohamed passed away peacefully due to his advanced age on Wednesday August 30, 2023. He enjoyed a long and fulfilling retirement surrounded by all the loved ones. dear to him We ask that our privacy be respected at this delicate moment", reads the statement issued by the family, in which it has also been reported that a funeral mass was held on Friday, following the traditions of the Islamic rite, in the central London mosque, in Regent's Park.
The son of a school inspector in Alexandria, Mohamed al Fayed started out as a street vendor of drinks and little by little developed a great entrepreneurial vision. He aspired to get out of the modest environment in which he grew up and rub shoulders with the political class and high society. But his shady deals with the Saudi arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi, brother of Samira, his first wife and mother of his son Dodi (1955), were a ballast that he always dragged in the social ascent of his he.
Since the seventies he had lived in the United Kingdom, where he created a million-dollar empire based on construction, transport and real estate companies, but the Pharaoh, as he was nicknamed, was never granted British nationality. Owner of the Harrods department store in London or Fulham FC, a Premier League team, he was also embroiled in a political scandal in 1994 when he paid thousands of pounds to Conservative MPs to illegally present questions on his behalf in the House of the Commons.
That is why his continuous attempts to get closer to the British royal family did not prosper. He only managed to establish a close relationship with Diana from Wales, whom he invited to spend the summer in 1997 at her house in the south of France. There he introduced his son Dodi, a film producer, whose great success was Chariots of Fire. But on August 31 of that year, Diana and Dodi died in an accident after leaving the Ritz hotel in Paris, owned by Mohamed al Fayed. From that day on, the businessman was obsessed with finding evidence to hold the British secret services responsible for the couple's accident with the royal family (especially with the queen's then husband, Philip of Edinburgh). According to the Egyptian millionaire, Buckingham Palace did not approve of the future king's mother marrying a Muslim.
However, Mohamed al Fayed was forced to admit defeat after an official investigation in 2008 concluded that what happened in Paris on August 31, 1997 had been an accident: the couple's driver was driving at high speed under the effects of alcohol in an attempt to dodge the paparazzi.
In 2010, after 26 years as owner, Al Fayed sold Harrods to the Qatari royal family. And in 2013, Fulham FC, which he had acquired in 1997.
Al Fayed was married twice, to Samira (1954-1956), and in 1985 to the former Finnish model Heini Wathén (68), with whom he lived until his death in Surrey County. The marriage had four children: Jasmine (42), Karim (40), Camilla (38) and Omar (35).
