THE brother of the Sultan of Brunei, one of the world’s richest men, has been ordered by a court to hand over properties and jewels worth billions of pounds in the most expensive family feud in legal history.

London-based Prince Jefri Bolkiah will try to challenge the latest ruling in the five-year battle with Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah, 59, over claims that he embezzled £8 billion in the 13 years that he was Finance Minister of the oil-rich state.

But the Prince, 51, will find it difficult to convince any court in Brunei of his right to appeal. His brother, who has ruled as an absolute monarch since 1967, has elevated himself to the same status as the Pope and declared himself infallible.

The Sultan has rewritten the country’s constitution, a copy of which has been passed to The Times, which now declares: “His Majesty the Sultan . . . can do no wrong in either his personal or any official capacity.”

The rewritten Constitution also warns off anyone from taking the Sultan’s name in vain in court anywhere in the world. “No person shall publish or reproduce in Brunei or elsewhere any part of proceedings . . . that may have the effect of lowering or adversely affecting directly or indirectly the position, dignity, standing, honour, eminence or sovereignty of His Majesty the Sultan.”

Prince Jefri, who has not spoken to his elder brother for two years, has been ordered by the Brunei court to sell his imposing mansion, St John’s Lodge in Regent’s Park; the five-star New York Palace Hotel in Manhattan; and the Bel-Air Hotel in Los Angeles, whose guests have included the Prince of Wales. A property at Place Vendôme in Paris, close to the Champs Elysées, a mansion in Singapore and an undisclosed quantity of cash and jewels are also being demanded by the courts.

The Sultan is now also pursuing property assets in Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, the Philippines, Japan, France, Britain and the US. Paintings, jewellery and cash held in bank accounts around the world are also on his wish list.

The Sultan has alleged that his brother has failed to repay £3 billion that was agreed in an out-of-court settlement in 2000. The Sultan has since alleged in courts in London and Brunei that unless Prince Jefri had “won the lottery or had some good evenings in the casino” his continued extravagant lifestyle, which allegedly costs £275,000 a month to maintain, was being funded by undisclosed assets.

A spokesman for the Brunei Investment Agency said: “It is hoped that Prince Jefri will voluntarily transfer other assets as required by the terms of the settlement without the necessity for further court orders.”

The ruling, by Chief Justice Mohammad Saied, relied upon the Sultan’s statute of personal infallibility which he granted himself in September 2004.

The Brunei court upheld an application by Freshfields, the London-based solicitors acting for the Sultan’s Brunei Investment Agency, for summary judgment against Prince Jefri.

The Sultan controls every aspect of life in Brunei. There is no elected representation of the people; the police and courts are answerable only to the Sultan. He is Prime Minister, Defence Minister, Finance Minister, Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, Supreme Head of Islam, chief of the Royal Brunei Police, head of the petroleum unit, and head of broadcasting and information services. Despite there appearing to be no identifiable threat to the country or its people, Brunei has been operating under a permanent state of emergency since December 1962.

The dispute has exposed the extraordinarily extravagant lifestyles of the two brothers. The Sultan’s palace has 1,788 rooms and corridors of gilt and marble. He has built mosques with minarets adorned in gold, pillars of Italian marble and welcome signs on their gates decorated with diamonds.

In 1996 Michael Jackson was flown in to perform for the Sultan’s 50th birthday, and the marriage of his eldest daughter the same year was marked with concerts by Stevie Wonder and Whitney Houston.

Prince Jefri, in a four-day auction in 2001, sold 400 Victorian lampposts, two unused Mercedes-Benz fire engines, several hundred Louis XIV gilt chairs, a fleet of forklift trucks, jewellery, the machinery to operate a bowling alley and 16,000 tonnes of Italian marble which were stored in 21 warehouses. He also had a 180ft yacht called Tits, complete with two tenders, Nipple I and Nipple II.

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