When al-Muntaṣir died, the senior commanders together with Ibn Abī al-Khaṣīb assumed the direction of affairs. ʿUtāmish warned them: “The moment you place any one of al-Mutawakkil’s sons in power, none of us will be spared.”
They replied, “The office has no one more suitable than Aḥmad ibn al-Muʿtaṣim; he is the son of our own patron.”
But Muḥammad ibn Mūsā the Astrologer whispered to them, “Will you enthrone a man who believes he has a stronger claim to the imamate than al-Mutawakkil? Choose someone who will recognize the favor you have done him.”
They rejected his counsel and gave Aḥmad the oath of allegiance. He held office for only a few days, and while he was entering the council-chamber of the caliphate a crowd of rabble, Shakariyya (1) troops, and soldiers—about a thousand men under arms—burst in, shouting, “Al-Muʿtazz—victory!”
Fighting broke out and a number of people were killed. Al-Mustaʿin withdrew to the Hārūnian palace and spent the night there. The mob plundered the palace itself and several other houses, seizing a large quantity of weapons, until Bughā the Younger drove them away from the caliphal residence and the deaths multiplied. Al-Mustaʿin then opened the treasuries to them, whereupon they quieted down. He received the oath of allegiance in Baghdad, whose governor was Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ṭāhir.
Later, at the instigation of the vizier ʿUtāmish, al-Mustaʿin became enraged with Aḥmad ibn al-Khaṣīb, confiscated his wealth, and banished him to the island of Crete (2).
When Ṭāhir ibn ʿAbd Allāh, governor of Khurāsān, died, al-Mustaʿin appointed his son Muḥammad ibn Ṭāhir in his place, and put Iraq and the Two Holy Sanctuaries under the charge of his brother Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh.
Bughā the Elder died as well, whereupon his son Mūsā ibn Bughā was appointed to succeed him.
Al-Mustaʿin imprisoned al-Muʿtazz and al-Muʾayyad, tightened the restraints on them, and forced them to sell their properties to him. He fixed for them an annual stipend of a little over twenty thousand dinars—no more.