Παρασκευή 23 Νοεμβρίου 2018

'Former Titular' Queen of Egypt turns 70


The former wife of Egypt's last monarch has her 70th birthday today. 'Princess' Fadila was married to former King Fouad II for 20 years, and is the mother of his three children. In the last 10 years, after the dissolution of their marriage, she lives a private life, and is not seen in any family photos, or in public. So let's see more about this woman!

Dominique-France Loeb-Picard (as her first name is) was born on 23 November 1948 in Paris, into a wealthy family of Jewish, French and Swiss ancestry. Her original religion was Judaism. She studied literature, and was reportedly writing her doctorate at the Sorbonne university on psychology of women in The Thousand and One Nights at the age of 29. Fadila met Fouad II (the 11th and last King of Egypt and the Sudan from Muhammad Ali dynasty, who was deposed by Gamal Abdel Nasser at the age of 17 months) in Switzerland. After some time of courtship with the former monarch (3 years her junior), they married on 16 April 1976, at a civil wedding in Paris. Dominique converted from Judaism to Islam, changed her name to Fadila and assumed the claimant title of 'Queen' of Egypt (even though monarchy here had been abolished since 1953). A year later and a half, in October 1977, King Fouad and 'Queen' Fadila married religiously at the Princely Palace of Monaco. Fadila choose a Turkish yashmark as her bridal headcraft, symbolising her convertion to her husband's religion. Together they are blessed with two sons and a daughter, while through their elder son Muhammad Ali, Prince of Sa'id (& his wife, Princess Noal Zaher Shah of Afghanistan) they have two grandchildren (a grandson & a granddaughter), twins, born in January last year.

The former King of Egypt bought an appartment on Avenue Foch (in Paris) for his family, where they lived a lavish life, while also travelling a lot and maintaining close ties with the royal dynasties of Saudi Arabia, Libya and Morocco. In 1996 Fouad and Fadila's marriage ended with divorse. When the legal procedures began in 1999, the King reportedly left his wife and three children in France, moving himself to Switzerland. According to a Swiss Court order, he should have payed her an allowance of £750 per-month, which Fadila said she never received. The Queen also stated that in the years after the separation the only resources her family received for living were those from the Saudi and Moroccan Royal families. She also took a loaming of £500,000 from a French bank just before the divorse (1995), but later failed to make the repayments, which resulted the seizure of her £2m (10-room, 280 sq metre) Paris appartment, which she was outsted from in 2002. Ever since then, they are not any reports about where does she currently live. Although some Egyptian monarchists still prefer to refer Fadila as Her Majesty Queen Fadila of Egypt, her official title was considered as Her Royal Highness Princess Fadila of Egypt by the former Royal family from 1996, while after the divorse proceedings finished in 2008, her royal titles were removed, and she became a commoner once again. Dominique-France/Fadila possibly maintains her relationship with her children, but only in private, while the official site of King Fouad II doesn't make references about her at all.
Additional links & information:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominique-France_Loeb-Picard
http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,915643,00.html
http://www.theroyalcouturier.com/2013/08/king-fouad-and-fadila-wedding-and-issues.html
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/egypt/1407397/Bank-seizes-Paris-flat-of-penniless-Egyptian-queen.html
http://royalcentral.co.uk/international/former-king-of-egypt-becomes-grandfather-for-the-first-time-74943
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/sep/16/paulwebster

Δεν υπάρχουν σχόλια:

Δημοσίευση σχολίου

A 'royal crisis', or unpredictable 'healthy renewal' of roles in British Royal Family ?

The last few months saw an increased raw of media spotlights to the British Royal family. Using the precondition of pending major royal c...