MEDIA: SAUDI PRINCE COMES TO MURDOCH'S AID
Riyadh, 7 Sept. (AKI) - Saudi Arabia's Prince al-Waleed ibnTalal announced Tuesday he has shifted his 5.46 percent stake in Rupert Murdoch's News Corp broadcasting and publishing empire, from non-voting to voting stock in a move that protects the Australian-born media tycoon against a possible raid by American John Malone, who owns Liberty Media and holds 18 percent of voting stock in News Corp. The announcement, which saw shares rise around one percent, reinforces the solid business ties between the Saudi prince and the media tycoon.
"Last November I said that I had the utmost confidence in Mr. Murdoch and his succession planning, and that if neccessary the Kingdom companies would replace their non-voting shares with voting shares and potentially purchase additional shares in support of Mr. Murdoch and his plans" al-Waleed said in a statement.
News Corp in August extended until 2007 its 'poison pill' plan to prevent Malone's Liberty media from increasing its stock, a move which some media reports say threatens Murdoch's plans for eventual succession.
According to Forbes Magazine the Saudi prince was in 2004 the fifth richest person on earth, with a fortune worth 21.5 billion dollars. In the past the prince has invested in various sectors including hotels, banking, telecommunications, media, technology, entertainment, construction, and real estate.
Prince al-Waleed, a member of the Saudi Royal Family, was born in Riyadh in 1955 and is the nephew of late King Fahd.
After attending university in the US - at Menlo college and Syracuse University - al- Waleed created a personal empire, which he manages through his two 'Kingdom' companies.
He is the biggest shareholder in the global financial services company Citigroup and holds stakes in the telecom supplier Motorola, the computer company Hewlett Packard, London's business area Canary Wharf, prestigious New York department store Saks Inc., and Kingdom centre - the tallest building in the Middle East.
Al-Waleed holds significant stakes in entertainment giants Time Warner and Walt Disney and is a leading hotellier, with significant investments in Four Seasons Hotels Resorts, the George V Hotel in Paris, Fairmont Hotels and Resorts and Movenpick Hotels and Resorts.
As well as being a businessman he is also a political activist who has called for a range of reforms in the Saudi Kingdom, including greater rights for women and democratic elections. He recently courted controversy when he took on Saudi Arabia's first ever female pilot, Hanadi Zakaria, to help fly his company's fleet of private jets.
In 2003 Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal funded the construction in Saudi Arabia of 1,000 homes during as a part of his humanitarian project to provide housing for the poor. More recently he financed the Islamic Art wing at Paris' Louvre Museum.
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