Aga Khan: Champion breeder, owner and coordinator of sport of kings

Born in Geneva, Switzerland, on December 13, 1936, His Highness Prince Karim Al-Hussaini Aga Khan IV spent his early childhood in Nairobi, Kenya. 

His Highness was the founder and chairman of the Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN), and was 88 at the time of his death.

In Kenya, as in other parts of the world, AKDN had a profound impact across many sectors, including education and healthcare.

A charismatic, benevolent, and visionary leader, His Highness will be remembered fondly for this famous quote he offered to the New York Times: “If you travel our developing world, poverty is seen as the driver of tragic despair, and there is ample possibility that any means out, will be taken. By assisting the poor through business, we are developing protection against extremism”. 

Indeed the AKDN which he founded has helped to build schools and hospitals, providing electricity for millions of people in the poorest parts of the world, and much more.

News of his death on Tuesday in Lisbon sent shock waves across the globe. 

He was an iconic figure in the global racing industry. Recognised the world over as a champion breeder, owner, and coordinator of horse-racing which is popularly known as ‘the sport of kings’, he rubber-stamped trademarks in many countries, with Ireland playing a significant role in his family’s renowned operation for north of a century. 

On so many levels, Irish racing, will forever be in his debt. Luckily, just two months ago, Ireland presented His Highness with the Greatest Contributor Award, hoping that awareness went some way towards acknowledging his immensely wonderful generosity, and unwavering support. His Highness attended Switzerland’s Le Rosey School before studying Islamic history at Harvard.

His Highness initially pondered whether to continue his family’s long tradition of thoroughbred racing and breeding, but was simply magnetized by its intense magic after winning the French owners’ championship in the first season. 

To say he was hooked, is an understatement.

“I love it passionately. A constant challenge awaits every time one sits down to play a game of chess with nature,” he said of horse-racing.

His stables and riders, wearing emerald-green silk livery, enjoyed enormous successes with 2,000 Guineas in Great Britain, and Epsom Derby hero, Sea the Stars. 

He also enjoyed success with runner Sinndar, who also won the Epsom Derby and Irish Derby, as well as in the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe in 2000 in France. We will always be spell-bound by Shergar, easiest ever winner of the Epsom Derby and Irish Derby, and King George, trained in Sir Michael Stoute’s camp, and ridden by British jockey Walter Swinburn. 

The Shergar Cup honours his magnificent thoroughbred at Ascot Racecourse in the United Kingdom annually, with teams competing. This is due to runner Shergar’s notorious kidnapping in 1983, from Ireland's Ballymany stud farm. 

Saddest story eternally, due to completely no conclusion. A ransom demand was made, with huge profilers suggested as abduction suspects, but no money was paid, nor any trace of Shergar, with his beaming white flash, was discovered.

Few persons bridged so many divides — between the spiritual, material, East, West; Muslim and Christian — as gracefully as the Aga Khan did.

He was larger than life. Married twice, he has a daughter, and three sons. They all participate in the racing genre. Talakan, Shamaki, Ashiyma, Calandagan, Zarigana, Shandana, Selemiah, Shamida, and, Tarawa, are merely a handful of the recent strikers, each a personal friend of His Highness. 

He treated each horse as a relative.

The funeral ceremony for His Highness will take place at the Ismaili Centre in Lisbon, Portugal, on Saturday.