I was a hotel receptionist – but now I’ll prove I’m a princess and heir to £4.3BILLION royal fortune
A FORMER hotel receptionist is on a mission to prove she is a royal princess – who should inherit a £4billion fortune.
Jane Benzaquen, 70, is fighting to be recognised as a Moroccan royal, claiming to be the daughter of the late King Hassan.
The 70-year-old Belgian-Israeli citizen has called on the country’s Royal family to submit DNA tests in order to prove she is a Moroccan princess.
She claims her Jewish mum had an affair with King Hassan at the age of 17, when she was working as a shop assistant in a clothes shop in Casablanca.
Jane says she was taken to Belgium as a baby and was raised by a foster family.
The grandma says that initially, she had no interest in digging into her past.
She told the Times: “I was filled with anger, the past was a Pandora’s box and I didn’t want to open it.”
But Jane decided she wanted to uncover the truth after watching the news of the King’s death in 1999.
She said: “When I saw that photo, it was as if, at last, I belonged to someone.
“Until then I didn’t look like anyone in my family, now I did, I was happy. It was a revelation for me.”
The woman already knew, thanks to DNA tests that Belgian Raoul Jossart, who was stated as her father on her birth certificate was not in fact her biological dad.
Three separate DNA tests proved she had in fact no Western European ancestry but her genetic roots came from North Africa and the Middle East.
Jane recalls her grandmother who moved to Belgium from Morocco, telling her stories about the royal Mercedes arriving at their home in Casablanca and dropping food and money.
She said the luxury vehicle would then take her mum Freha to trysts with the prince which resulted in the love affair.
The relationship allegedly lasted for two years between 1951 and 1953- the King was later said to have been infatuated with French actress Etchika Choureau before his marriage to Moroccan Lalla Latif.
In her fight to be recognised as a Moroccan royal, Jane has employed Belgian lawyer Marc Uyttendaele.
Uyttendaele hopes to persuade Hassan’s children or even another relative to submit a DNA test.
“Having blue blood doesn’t mean you should be treated differently from anyone else,” the lawyer said.