Sultan's Stay Grows Richer With Rumors -- Did He Buy Hotel Or Just Rent It?

Poor Sultan of Brunei.

Ever since word leaked that Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah - better known as the richest man in the world - was coming to the APEC conference, he has been grist for the rumor mill.

It was said he was searching for a personal concierge - someone he would pay $50,000 for three days' work. Reports had him booking the top floor of the Four Seasons Olympic Hotel, then subsequent rumors had him staying at the Westin, then the Alexis. Speculation about the arrival of his private plane, possibly outfitted with a whirlpool bath, shifted from Thursday to Wednesday and back to Thursday again.

By the time his plane, an Airbus A310, finally reached Boeing Field late yesterday afternoon, the sultan had fired the imagination of more people than all the other visiting dignitaries combined.

The more he shied from the news, the more he piqued public curiosity.

Part of the reason the sultan draws so much interest is that for the most part, he has succeeded in keeping his private life private. Although he has now been in power for more than 26 years, relatively little is known about the sultan.

He derives much of his wealth, estimated at $37 billion, from being the absolute ruler of a small Asian country with big oil and gas reserves.

In his younger days, the 47-year-old sultan had the reputation of being a polo-playing playboy, the Prince Charles of Brunei's royal family. But since then he has reportedly settled down, gotten married - twice, in fact - and become a more devout Muslim.

When he makes news, it is usually because of the money he's spent or given away.

Last year he pledged $1 million to an aid fund for Muslims in Bosnia-Herzegovina. More recently, he is said to have left a $170,000 tip at a hotel in Cyprus.

The sultan gets hit up for a variety of causes.

As part of the Iran-contra dealings seven years ago, Elliott Abrams, assistant secretary of state in the Reagan administration, asked the sultan for $10 million for the contras; the money was sent to a Swiss bank account.

Even in Seattle, the sultan hasn't been immune from outstretched palms. About three dozen homeless people and low-income housing advocates marched to where they thought he was staying (the Four Seasons Olympic) to ask him to help the city pay for public toilets. They got there before he did, so they left a note.

Information about the sultan is often summed up in impressive, but impersonal, statistics.

He lives in the world's largest palace, which has 1,778 rooms; he has 165 Rolls-Royces; in 1987 he bought the Beverly Hills Hotel for $185 million.

With a dearth of information on the man himself, rumors have filled the void.

It was the rumored purchase of another hotel that had tongues wagging just before his arrival from London. In its initial form, the report was that the sultan had bought Seattle's Alexis Hotel.

It was a rumor Louis Richmond, spokesman for the Alexis' San Francisco owners, Kimco Hotel and Restaurant, had to put down so often it became automatic.

"No, he's not," Richmond barked into the phone even before hearing the question.

Then the rumor came back in another form: that the sultan had rented out the place - the whole place - and that staff was working overtime to make the hotel to his liking.

Management kept mum.

"We hear the rumors just as you do. We just prefer to maintain our policy of being very discreet about the guests that are staying here," said John Arnett, regional vice president for the hotel group.

A local business manager who knows Alexis staff members said the employees had worked a couple of nights till early in the morning, recarpeting, repainting and refurnishing the rooms with furniture bought at David Weatherford Antiques and Interiors. A designer for the store said the Alexis has requested that employees not speak to reporters about the furniture. Another local businesswoman said she saw "lots of black Mercedes" cars in the hotel's underground parking area and must now sign in and out when she enters it.

Jafar Ismail, protocol officer for the Brunei delegation, meanwhile, maintains that the sultan is staying at the Four Seasons Olympic, and it was to the Four Seasons that the sultan's motorcade headed after leaving Boeing Field yesterday.

During his Seattle stay, the sultan will mostly be occupied with the official events, Ismail said. And to the likely dismay of shop owners all over, he added: "It is doubtful that he will have time for anything else."

Seattle Times staff reporters Helen E. Jung and Sylvia Wieland Nogaki contributed to this report.