THE STUDENT SHEIKH

When Sheikh Khalifa bin Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani (30), another of the emir’s brothers, moved to Los Angeles to study at the University of Southern California, an entire economy sprouted to meet his wishes. “His Highness doesn’t like to hear no,” one associate lecturer said at the time. His entourage included a security detail, concierges, trainers, a butler whose sole job was to make tea, another aide who only tended to his hookah pipe, a nurse, an all-purpose fixer and even, according to several varsity faculty members, a graduate student who served as his “academic sherpa”. Khalifa received a master’s degree, despite never setting foot on campus, an LA Times investigation revealed. His enablers went to extraordinary lengths to keep him happy, the paper said, including forging documents, flouting university rules, plying a university dean with a golden camel statue and giving a Rolex to a professor. Known to his pals as “KHK,” he occasionally rubbed shoulders with minor LA royalty, including Scott Disick, the father of reality TV star Kourtney Kardashian Barker’s three children. A spokesman for the prince responded only to say the LA Times investigation was “racially insensitive” and “bigoted”.