and Taher Bakeer, Governor of Tripolitania and father-in-law. , governor of
Cyrenaica.
Wanis al-Qaddafi and General
Mahmud Buguaitin are standing behind the prince. Hasan was born in 1928 the fifth son of
Muhammad ar-Ride as-Senussi (1890–1955, the brother of the then emir of
Cyrenaica,
Idris of Libya) and his tenth wife
Imbaraika al-Fallatiyya. He was educated at
Al-Taj,
Kufra and
Al-Azhar University in
Cairo,
Egypt. On 24 December 1951, Libya became independent. Following the death of his father, he was nominated
crown prince by his uncle
King Idris I on 26 October 1956.
1969 revolution The events of
September 1969 proved to be pivotal both for Crown Prince Hasan and for
Libya. As Crown Prince, Hasan was first in line to succeed to the Libyan throne. The ailing King Idris presented a signed document on 4 August 1969 to the President of the Libyan Senate, whereby Idris was to abdicate in favour of the Crown Prince. The instrument of abdication specified 2 September, the date when the
King undertook formally to step down. Indeed, the Crown Prince was already exercising regal powers in the name of King Idris, in the run up to 2 September. However, on 1 September, while Idris was out of the country undergoing medical treatment, a group of Libyan army officers, among them
Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi, staged a rebellion and announced that
King Idris was deposed. Since King Idris I was unable to complete his reign as envisaged by his instrument of abdication, Hasan never actually became King. His legacy, however, was in his role of Crown Prince, exercised between 1956 and 1969, towards the end of which he was the
de facto ruler of Libya. As Crown Prince, he repeatedly undertook official trips abroad, notably to negotiate the purchase of
U.S.-built jet fighters from the
Kennedy Administration for the
Libyan Air Force.
House arrest and death Following the revolution, Hasan was kept under
house arrest in Libya, tried in the
Libyan People's Court and sentenced to three years in prison in November 1971. In 1984, the Crown Prince and his family were thrown out of their house, which was then burnt down, and forced to move into cabins on one of Tripoli's public beaches. It was in these cabins that the Crown Prince suffered a stroke in 1986. In 1988, the Crown Prince was permitted by Colonel Gaddafi to travel for medical treatment to
London, where he died in 1992. The Crown Prince was buried beside his uncle King Idris at
Al-Baqi' Cemetery,
Medina,
Saudi Arabia. Prior to his death in 1992, he appointed his second son,
Mohammed El Senussi (born 1962), to succeed him as head of the
Royal House of Libya. ==References==