Renewed arguments over the distribution of oil revenues also caused the 1995 palace coup that brought Sheikh Khalifa’s son, Sheikh Hamad, to power. Although his father had permitted Hamad to take over day-to-day governing some years before, Khalifa contested the coup. Before Hamad fully consolidated his power, he had to weather an attempted countercoup in 1996 and a protracted lawsuit with his father over the rightful ownership of billions of dollars of invested oil revenues, which was finally settled out of court.
