Brunei's ruler Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah will host a party next month to seal his marriage to a 26-year-old Malaysian woman, a report said today.

The Berita Harian newspaper said it could be held at the sultan's Istana Nurul Imam, with 1,788 rooms, or the second of his four palaces, the Istana Nurul Izzah.

The gold-domed Istana Nurul Imam, his official residence, has a banquet hall that seats 5,000 and is reputed to be the world's largest residential palace.

Newspapers have reported that the 58-year-old ruler made Azrinaz Mazhar Hakim, a former television journalist, his second wife at a private ceremony in Kuala Lumpur last Friday.

Authorities in Brunei, where the private lives of the royal family are often shrouded in secrecy, have not confirmed the report.

Sources close to the palace said there was no indication the party would be elaborate, the paper reported.

"If there was going to be a big party, preparations should have begun. Maybe the wedding reception will be a small one," the source said.

"Usually, for wedding ceremonies at the Brunei palace, cooks are invited from Kuala Lumpur. As of now, we have no instructions."

Azrinaz quit Malaysian station TV3 in May, reportedly saying that she wanted to "venture into other undertakings."

Brunei, a cradle-to-grave welfare state on the north coast of Borneo island, is the world's fourth-largest natural gas producer and third largest oil producer in Southeast Asia.

The sultan was once rated the world's richest man with more than 40 billion dollars but his fortune is said to have dwindled.

In 2003 he divorced former flight attendant Mariam Abdul Aziz. Polygamy is legal in the Muslim nation and he remains married to first wife Anak Saleha, whom he wed in 1967.