BBC love rat Tim dumped by his new young wife
SUAVE newsreader Tim Willcox left his first wife devastated when he embarked on a passionate affair with his fellow married BBC presenter Sophie Long.
Now, he has received his comeuppance.
I hear that his second wife is divorcing him after scarcely two years of marriage.
Willcox, 58, married Najah al-Otaibi, who is 18 years his junior, in 2019. She’s a Saudi Arabian political analyst who often appears on BBC news programmes.
At the time, a source close to Willcox said: ‘Tim is very happy and has been gushing about Najah to his colleagues.’ Now it’s all over. One of Najah’s friends tells me: ‘She’s divorcing him.’ The pal claims: ‘It’s very acrimonious.’
Rumours that the marriage was in trouble began circulating last summer, two years after they were photographed cuddling at Royal Ascot, months before their wedding.
Willcox hit the headlines in 2012 when he had an affair with Sophie Long, now 45.
He had attended her wedding to yacht company sales director and childhood sweetheart Will Green, 46, in Cornwall in 2010.
As a former member of the British Youth Orchestra, Willcox even serenaded the happy couple with his trumpet.
The pair, who sometimes jointly presented the BBC’s 24-hour news channel, were said to have been banned from appearing on screen together.
Willcox left his wife of 17 years, Sarah, with whom he has four children. And Long left her husband, but her relationship with Willcox came to an end in 2014.
Willcox was later romantically linked with another blonde, Tessa Hardy, 60, whom he met when he was still with Long.
Friends of her husband, the telecoms multi-millionaire Warren Hardy, 65, said he was devastated to discover Willcox had wheedled his way into his wife’s affections, as the couple, who had been married for 24 years, were undergoing a ‘trial separation’.
The friend said Willcox was ‘taking advantage’ of the situation that recent business problems had placed a strain on the Hardys’ marriage.
Both Willcox and Al-Otaibi declined to comment.