People are of course complicated, but Fayed seems, uh, more complicated than most [1]:
> In 1964 Fayed arrived in Haiti, one of the world’s poorest nations, hailed as a rich sheikh from Kuwait. He romanced one of Papa Doc’s daughters and persuaded Duvalier to give him an oil concession and a contract to manage the Port-au-Prince harbour. The Duvaliers’ love affair with Fayed was short-lived. Early in 1965 the fake sheikh left Haiti, never to return. More than $100,000 (almost $1m today) was reportedly found to be missing from the port authority’s bank account.
> A dangerous opponent, [Fayed] would make the wildest allegations in public as well as private against enemies or those he blamed for setbacks. He fabricated documents and paid witnesses to perjure themselves. It was often difficult to detect whether Fayed himself believed the allegations he repeated with such conviction.
> There were repeated allegations of sexual harassment of female staff. Some who complained were accused of theft and on occasions arrested by local police only too willing to accept allegations (later dropped) from a powerful patron. In 2009 the Crown Prosecution Service decided not to charge Fayed over the claim he had sexually assaulted a 15-year-old girl at the store. Fayed had been interviewed by Scotland Yard under caution. He was interviewed again in 2013 after a woman alleged he had sexually attacked her at his Park Lane apartment after a job interview. The police reopened the case in 2015 but took no further action. Fayed always denied the allegations. Further sexual harassment allegations were made by former Harrods employees in a Channel 4 documentary in 2017 and to Channel 4 News in 2018. One ex-employee claimed to have accepted £60,000 to drop a sexual harassment claim. Fayed again denied the allegations and the police took no action.
I guess you could also claim that the British press has had and continues to have it out for him, so these are just skewed portrayals of a bon vivant, or something. But from the uninformed outside he certainly looks like a guy who made his money as a fixer/corruption specialist (like the people who built industrial empires after the collapse of the USSR -- they certainly won a hard game, but it's difficult to say they did something good) and mostly used it to make life unpleasant for people around him.
Back issues of Private Eye from the late 80s and 90s almost certainly cover a lot of his dodgy dealings for anyone wanting to know more. Probably mention him in their next podcast too (~20th Sept? Their output is erratic.)
mycologos|2 years ago
> In 1964 Fayed arrived in Haiti, one of the world’s poorest nations, hailed as a rich sheikh from Kuwait. He romanced one of Papa Doc’s daughters and persuaded Duvalier to give him an oil concession and a contract to manage the Port-au-Prince harbour. The Duvaliers’ love affair with Fayed was short-lived. Early in 1965 the fake sheikh left Haiti, never to return. More than $100,000 (almost $1m today) was reportedly found to be missing from the port authority’s bank account.
> A dangerous opponent, [Fayed] would make the wildest allegations in public as well as private against enemies or those he blamed for setbacks. He fabricated documents and paid witnesses to perjure themselves. It was often difficult to detect whether Fayed himself believed the allegations he repeated with such conviction.
> There were repeated allegations of sexual harassment of female staff. Some who complained were accused of theft and on occasions arrested by local police only too willing to accept allegations (later dropped) from a powerful patron. In 2009 the Crown Prosecution Service decided not to charge Fayed over the claim he had sexually assaulted a 15-year-old girl at the store. Fayed had been interviewed by Scotland Yard under caution. He was interviewed again in 2013 after a woman alleged he had sexually attacked her at his Park Lane apartment after a job interview. The police reopened the case in 2015 but took no further action. Fayed always denied the allegations. Further sexual harassment allegations were made by former Harrods employees in a Channel 4 documentary in 2017 and to Channel 4 News in 2018. One ex-employee claimed to have accepted £60,000 to drop a sexual harassment claim. Fayed again denied the allegations and the police took no action.
I guess you could also claim that the British press has had and continues to have it out for him, so these are just skewed portrayals of a bon vivant, or something. But from the uninformed outside he certainly looks like a guy who made his money as a fixer/corruption specialist (like the people who built industrial empires after the collapse of the USSR -- they certainly won a hard game, but it's difficult to say they did something good) and mostly used it to make life unpleasant for people around him.
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/02/mohamed-al-fay...
zimpenfish|2 years ago