Son of the previous caliph, Muhammad al-Nasir,[1] the ten-year-old Yusuf was unexpectedly appointed heir by his father on his deathbed.
[3] Young and pleasure-loving, Yusuf II left the governing of the Almohad empire to a carefully balanced oligarchy composed of older family members, like his father's brothers in al-Andalus and his grand-cousin Abu Abd Allah Muhammad ibn Abi Hafs in Ifriqiya, Marrakesh palace bureaucrats such as the vizier Abu Sa‘id Uthman ibn Jam‘i and the leading sheikhs of the Almohad Masmuda tribes.
Yusuf II died suddenly in early 1224 – accidentally gored while playing with his pet cows.
[2] Lacking heirs, the palace bureaucrats, led by Ibn Jam‘i, quickly engineered the election of his elderly grand-uncle Abd al-Wahid I as the new caliph in Marrakesh.
But the hastiness and probable unconstitutionality of the Marrakesh proceedings upset his uncles, the brothers of al-Nasir, in al-Andalus.