Page 117 - Truncal States to UAE_Neat

Chapter Three

ment as a Trucial Ruler, as an incentive to granting landing rights on
an emergency air-strip. But he died suddenly at the end of April 1937
during a visit to Khaur Fakkan, while his eldest son Hamad was still
a minor. His daughter 'A’ishah bint Sa'id look immediate steps to
protect the shaikhdom from usurpers. Even before her seriously-ill
father had actually died she rushed back to the fort in Kalba,
organised its defences, put the slave Barut in charge, and sent a
message to her husband Shaikh Khalid bin Ahmad (ex-Ruler of
Sharjah), who had become the most powerful member of the Qasimi
clan, and who was visiting Ra’s al Khaimah at the time.
The question of succession in Kalba soon developed into a drawn-
out dispute involving everybody who was anybody in politics north
and east of Dubai: the Ruler of Ra’s al Khaimah, Sultan bin Salim,
(brother of Sa'id bin Hamad’s widow); the Ruler of Sharjah, Sultan
bin Saqr; the ex-Ruler of Sharjah, Khalid bin Ahmad; the wali of
Dibah, Rashid bin Ahmad; the leader of the Naqbiyln, Salim bin
'Abdullah;34 the wali of Suhar in Oman and the Sultan of Muscat; all
the notable residents of Kalba and its neighbourhood, and last but
not least the representatives of the British Government: the Re­
sidency Agent in Sharjah, Khan Bahadur Sayyid 'Abdul Razaq al
Razuqi, his superiors, the Political Agent in Bahrain, the Political
Resident in Bushire, and the Senior Naval Officer.
At the insistence of the British Government, the notables of Kalba,
who had already slated that they wanted to have the twelve-year-old
boy Hamad bin Sa'id as successor, were required to choose a Regent
for him. In the presence of the Residency Agent they selected in June
1937 the slave Barut, a choice which was not acceptable to some of
the British officials.35 Eventually a compromise was achieved by the
election as Regent by the notables of Kalba of Khalid bin Ahmad, ex-
Ruler of Sharjah, husband of the deceased’s daughter.
He was allowed to keep his previously allocated fiefdom of Daid
and he accepted that Barut was in charge of the day-to-day affairs of
Kalba. The Regent Khalid bin Ahmad set about sorting out the many
differences and disputes which had been absorbing the entire tribal
population of Shamaillyah and the other eastern tracts of the Qasimi
realm. Since he did not have enough funds to pay off tribal leaders he
had to rely on his diplomacy. When he succeeded in gaining influence
over most of the tribes of that area, even over the Sharqiyln, his
relatives and rivals in Sharjah and Ra’s al Khaimah did not support
him for fear of his becoming too powerful. During the 1940s Khalid

92

|