by Do you like glitz and glamour? We have a new empire bling-esque Netflix reality show that’s packed with stuff, thanks to a Dubai Bling cast of some of the richest and most affluent residents of the UAE.
One of the most exciting additions to the cast is Loujain Adada, a 33-year-old Lebanese model and television host best known for her late husband, a much older Saudi businessman whom she married when she was not was only 21 years old. In the first episode of Dubai Bling the first season – which debuted on Netflix on Thursday, October 27 – Adada discussed her past marriage and over-the-top nuptials.
“The wedding was like a fairy tale. I felt like a princess,” she said. “They had a wedding that was the talk of the town for a long time,” cast member Zeina Khoury revealed. “Her wedding cost over $10 million. She wore a necklace worth over $2 million. She even wore a Karl Lagerfeld dress that was worth over $200,000. Everyone was transported to her wedding in Venice in private jets.”
“A lot of people criticized me because the age difference between us was almost 30 years,” Adada said of her late husband. “But love has no age.”
Here’s what we know about Loujain Adada’s late husband and their relationship.
Loujain Adada husband: who is he?
Loujain Adada was married to billionaire Arab businessman Walid Ahmed Juffali from November 2012 until his death in July 2016. Born on April 30, 1955, Juffali was 57 at the time of her marriage to Adada and 61 at time of his death in Switzerland.
“Unfortunately he passed away from cancer,” Adada said of her late husband. “And it happened just a month after I gave birth to my second daughter.” (Juffali had six children in all, including the two, Talia, seven, and Lana, six, whom he shared with Adada.)
Juffali was the chairman of EA Juffali and Brothers, Saudi Arabia’s largest private company, a position he assumed after the death of his father Ahmed bin Abdullah Al Juffali. He was also Chairman of W Investments, a private investment company based in Zurich.
In the 2019 book Moneyland: The Inside Story of the Crooks and Kleptocrats Who Rule the Worldauthor Oliver Bullough wrote of Juffali: “His wealth was, according to a later judgment of the court, immeasurable: ‘in common with men of his wealth and origin, he crosses and recrosses the world, largely by private jet, staying at properties in various countries owned by him or on his behalf, through elaborate financial structures.
“His family ran large infrastructure projects in Saudi Arabia, and his father had made his fortune by entering into partnership agreements with Western companies, such as Electrolux, Mercedes, IBM, Siemens and others. Walid took the chairman of the family business, EA Juffali. & Bros., in 1994,” Bullough wrote. “As well as the £100million mansion near Windsor, he also owned a converted church in Knightsbridge, a country retreat in Devon and property in Saudi Arabia, Switzerland and elsewhere. charity in 2005, he spent nearly half a million pounds on two photographs: one of Tamara Mellon nude; the other of Kate Moss nude.”
Prior to his marriage to Loujain “LJ” Adada, Juffali was married to fellow Saudi Arabian Basma Al-Sulaiman from 1980 to 2000 and had three children with her. When they divorced, Al-Sulaiman received a £40million settlement. His second marriage was to American model Christina Estrada from 2001 to 2014; the couple had a daughter together.
Juffali was actually still legally married to Estrada when he married Adada. (According to Saudi law, as a Muslim, Juffali could take up to four wives.) He divorced Estrada under Islamic law without her knowledge via the controversial use of the triple talak, in which a man can legally divorce his wife by saying “I divorce you” three times.
In their divorce, Estrada won a £75million settlement, including a £53million payout. Estrada released a statement after the decision, per The Guardian (opens in a new tab)“I never wanted to be here. I always wanted to resolve the matter amicably. This process has been incredibly deadly and painful. Walid and I have been married for 12 years and have a beautiful daughter together. He took a second wife and divorced me without my knowledge.”
Fortune of Loujain Adada
By an obituary in The Independent (opens in a new tab), Walid Ahmed Juffali’s fortune at the time of his death was estimated at £8 million. Most of Loujain Adada’s net worth comes from her inheritance of her late husband’s assets, which were also divided among his former wives and children. Adada’s current net worth is valued at $4 million.
“The only cure for grief is to grieve. Everyone has their own way of grieving. It’s not a sign of weakness, it’s an emotional, physical and spiritual necessity, the price to pay for the love,” Adada told luxury publication Ccircle. (opens in a new tab) in 2019. “The loss of Walid, my late husband and father of my two young daughters, has been so hard and difficult for me. You never know how strong they are until being strong is their only choice.”
She continued, “Until today we talk about him, we miss him and we pray for him. Walid was an inspiring man with a big heart and had a great love for life. One of his favorite sayings was: “Life is not about waiting. for the storm to pass, it is a question of learning to dance in the rain.”
In the first episode of Dubai Blingthe reality star shares, “I’ve been in Dubai for almost a year now, and now I feel like I’m ready to be with someone else and start anew in my life.”
Dubai Bling is now streaming on Netflix from Thursday, October 27.
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