Sharif Husayn Pasha, the next eldest of the Awn clan, was appointed to the Emirate and arrived from Istanbul in August.

As was customary, the heir-apparent Awn al-Rafiq was then himself summoned to the capital, where he was appointed to the Ottoman Council of State with the rank of vizier.

He instead appointed the elderly Sharif Abd al-Muttalib ibn Ghalib of the Dhawu Zayd, who had been held in Istanbul for the past two decades following his deposition in 1856.

Immediately after Husayn's death, James Zohrab, the British consul in Jeddah, wrote to his superiors that British interests demanded the appointment of Awn al-Rafiq, who was "liberal and enlightened", while Abd al-Muttalib was "a fanatical Wahhabee" with a "hatred of Christians and foreigners".

The British ambassador to Istanbul, Austen Henry Layard, asked the Sultan not to appoint Abd al-Muttalib, but was told that the decision had already been made.