In a traditional ceremony on Wednesday, Malaysia named its new king, a billionaire sultan known for his outspokenness and determined to play a key role in ensuring his country's political stability.
Ibrahim Sultan Iskandar, an influential 65-year-old sultan, was sworn in at the National Palace in the capital Kuala Lumpur.
“With this oath, I solemnly and sincerely swear to be loyal and to govern fairly for Malaysia in accordance with the laws and the Constitution,” the new sovereign said during the televised event attended by Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim and other members of the ruling elite.
Last year, the sultan was named the future king of this constitutional monarchy, in which every five years the heads of families of the country's nine ancient kingdoms elect one of them to rule Malaysia.
A coronation ceremony is scheduled to take place in a few months.
The king's role is essentially an honorary one in Malaysia, but his role has increased in recent years amid fractures in the Malaysian political landscape, with the king's intervention being required three times to appoint a prime minister.
In addition to overseeing important political offices, the ruler has the right to pardon and is the official leader of Islam in the predominantly Muslim country as well as the commander-in-chief of the armed forces. Criticism deemed to incite contempt is punishable by imprisonment.
In an interview with Singaporean daily The Straits Times in December, the Sultan said he did not want to be a “puppet king.”
“There are 222 of them (parliamentarians) in Parliament. There are more than 30 million of them (Malaysians) out there. I’m not with you, I’m with them,” he told the daily.
“I will support the government, but if I think it is doing something wrong, I will tell it,” he added, according to the daily.
Ibrahim comes from the rich and powerful royal family of Johor, which has its own private army. Bloomberg estimates the wealth of the Sultan and his family at at least $5.7 billion.
He is close to the reformist Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, who was appointed at the end of 2022, and regularly comments on the political news in the country. He is an active leader, partly trained as a military officer in the USA, as well as a motorcycle enthusiast and father of six children.