PL charge City for alleged breaches of financial rules

Damocles said:
As I say, a lot of info we have comes from CIA cables released during various WIkileaks scandals and other non-classified documents and it's fair to say by the notes made from the Middle Eastern desks that they barely understand who is who and who does what.

Here's something to ponder - is Sheikh Mansour a powerful man?

Here's the Western view. Sheikh Mansour is the Vice President of the UAE, in addition to other duties such as the Deputy Prime Minister and Minster of Presidential Affairs which controls access to the President. Therefore he holds numerous positions of power and influence in an autocratic society.

Here's the UAE view. Sheikh Mansour is the son of Sheikh Zayed and one of the Bani Fatima brothers. He is not the head of his family and answers to MbZ totally and without qualification. The role given as DPM was negotiated during the formation of the country as being held by an Al Nahyan with the other tribes. Sheikh Mansour was made UAE Vice President, against the country's constitution, in order to punish the Al Maktoum family for embarrassing the UAE a decade earlier, for the Head of their family having his affairs dragged in court with his daughters which embarrassed the nation internationally, and to move Sheikh Mansour into more diplomatic conferences where he shines brighter. Abu Dhabi/the Al Nahyan are attempting to be treated as serious long term investors in the global markets and although still very loyal, they are starting to consider the Al Maktoums their troublesome backwater cousins who don't know how to behave and ruin their reputation akin to the Beverley Hillbillies. Sheikh Mansour was Western educated, is an ultra MbZ loyalist for historical and almost religious reasons (the Bani Fatima loyalty is based on a promise made to never attack your own family due to this happening in the past and it fucking up the tribe). He is not Sheikh Mansour in the structures of power. He is a person who exists to politically execute the will of MBZ.

Here's the CIA view. These people are nuts. Their power structures and inter-tribal loyalties and marriages and duties reference shit that happened 300 years ago on some random day in the desert where someone caught a falcon or some shit. Sheikh Mansour is an average C student in the US only noted because he liked NBA and football (soccer). He was quiet, not particularly outgoing or academic and mainly kept to himself while in the US outside a few incidents of awkwardness as a student. While MBZ got on with the job of becoming the next ruler, he mainly spaffed around with nature and conversation projects in his Government job and sports investment in his spare time. He really enjoys sport and the only thing he ever seemed to excel at was camel racing. He somewhat controversially got married to his first wife who was deemed unsuitable and quietly "retired from public life" until he married another woman with which he settled down and had kids. His first wife was an internal Abu Dhabi marriage to one of the "2 quarters" families mentioned before because they seemed to actually like each other from children. His second wife was a member of Dubai family which was right and proper and expected. Him and Khaldoon seem to be actual friends rather than Khaldoon and MbZ who have more of a employer-employee relationship. He's somewhat average, a bit head in the clouds at times unlike his very serious brothers who became leaders of military etc, but seems likeable to other leaders so did very well in diplomatic circles hence as an important brother, was given roles that suited his personality.

Essentially if you want to know if Mansour is powerful then it very much depends on your definition of what that means. By one view he has almost no political power at all. By another view he has almost complete political power. You can bias this however you want when writing about it.

I will say one thing - the "Abu Dhabi bought City to sportswash" thing to my understanding is the wrongest thing to ever be wrong in the history of wrongness. You can argue that's what we're used for now (and I don't agree) but to suggest that's why we're bought is totally incorrect. Sheikh Mansour just quite likes football. The UAE is a former British protectorate, it exists as a country due to help from the British, he grew up watching the BBC and whatever passes for MOTD on the World Service in the 70s and 80s. It has a strong British culture element to it and one of the best friends of Sheikh Zayed before he formed the UAE was a British explorer whose writings are now a major academic source for the landscape between the tribes at the time. It was noted in his time at University in the US that he enjoyed football. It was further noted that before his brother ascended to the crown and he was just the lesser important brother without too much to do in his 30s and 40s that decided to buy a football club which was brokered by one of the Dubai Hillbilly clan who then immediately set back their desire to be seen as serious businessmen rather than inept moneypots by 20 years. I can absolutely guarantee if MbZ knew about this at the time and understood how important to the reputation that a football club in the back arse of Manchester would become to the global reputation of Abu Dhabi and the UAE then he would have back handed his little brother and told him to grow up and stop playing games. City are now the most visible aspect of the Al Nahyan family, the thing that they are globally associated with more than any other business. Not to business leaders obviously but to the wider general public. Sheikh Mansour is not "the little brother of the leader", he is "that guy who owns Man City" which I'm sure is a source of real annoyance to MbZ and possibly one of great humour to Sheikh Mansour. If they had their way, these people would have absolutely nothing to do with us, but they're stuck with us now for the next several decades at least and they understand that they have to be successful.

Which member of the Bani Yas owns what and who gave what to who is so far off their radar in terms of importance and cheating that it beggars belief. Their State doesn't function in this manner.
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You have twice now demonstrated great knowledge and understanding of UAE. Superb stuff. I’m sure the Times would use it if you asked them, it will be great background when we are cleared. Martin Samuel could be useful.
Well done, brilliant. How do you know all this?
 
Damocles said:
For some of Sheikh Khalifa's early life, he was a tribal nomad. This means that he walked around the Arabian desert stopping at the same hunting and water spots that his tribe had stopped at for thousands of years. Small towns btw, not tents, but their travel was seasonal and often hunting based before Sheikh Zayed reformed the country.

Imagine that conversation.

"Right, I've got a plan to catapult us into the stratosphere your Highness. It involves some cash, Clayton Ailines, and Richard Dunne"

"Richard....Dunne?"
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Haha... I was at Bootham Crescent, so i can relate. Have you read the file on HHSM mother?
 
supercity88 said:
Unnecessary is the key word. You are talking about people with extreme wealth. Why would they risk it all by carrying out fraudulent activity at a football club which is small beer compared to other projects?

There are very few high profile cases of fraud and those that have occured are due to a lack of liquid assets and processes to create an impression of wealth that didn't exist. Our owners have buckets of cash, there's no need to pretend it exists or funnel it fraudulently.
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Money talks, wealth whispers.
 
KS55 said:
You have twice now demonstrated great knowledge and understanding of UAE. Superb stuff. I’m sure the Times would use it if you asked them, it will be great background when we are cleared. Martin Samuel could be useful.
Well done, brilliant. How do you know all this?
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He is no stranger to the wilder shores of the internet.
 
Shirley said:
I was a regular at Maine Road in the 60’s and I can honestly say I never met one of these fans who went to Maine Road one week and the swamp the next.
Perhaps it’s a myth.
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I did. We couldn’t afford to travel to the aways so did the next best thing. I watched Duncan Edwards who would have been one of the greatest footballers ever.
It was after Munich and stories I heard about Trafford Utd that I came down hard for City.
 
KS55 said:
You have twice now demonstrated great knowledge and understanding of UAE. Superb stuff. I’m sure the Times would use it if you asked them, it will be great background when we are cleared. Martin Samuel could be useful.
Well done, brilliant. How do you know all this?
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Books, academic papers, some humint and leaks. I can assure you that the press would never ask me about this because I very vaguely know what I'm talking about. Stress on the very vaguely. The UK press don't care and don't want to care about the UAE. Rich Islam terrorists Arabs who spend money on pointless shit is their view and they'll always continue this
 
Eccles Blue said:
I did. We couldn’t afford to travel to the aways so did the next best thing. I watched Duncan Edwards who would have been one of the greatest footballers ever.
It was after Munich and stories I heard about Trafford Utd that I came down hard for City.
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Me too, my older brothers took me to home games at both in the 50s but I stopped going to the swamp except to watch City or internationals in 1958.
 
KS55 said:
I’m not sure what VP really means, they never explained. It wasn’t a post the last time I looked at their constitution, whereas DPM, of which there are currently four is an official title given to senior members of the cabinet, which is also not what you might think it is at first glance.
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i remember what a vpl was though,
in the days before thongs took over.
 
malg said:
Me and a couple of mates who worked in Asda Longsight back in the early 80s used to go to either Maine Road or the Toilet back in the day. Basically just a Saturday out with a couple of lads and a few beers. Took the football in every now and then and whoever was at home was the match we picked - didn't even bother with who the opposition was. Didn't do it every week, probably 5 or 6 times a season. Even went to Sunderland away with the Rags one season just because it was a bit of a laugh and a day out.......nearly didn't end well that one though.
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i had the misfortune to live in longsight for a few months in '86.

asda used to have stacks of free monthly promotional magazines for their products,
in the back pages of which were cut-out coupons/vouchers.

on the date of the magazine's release,
we used to fill a trolley with them,
take them home round the corner,
cut out all the coupons and return with pockets full of them.

the till staff were ace, they didn't give a shit.
no matter what you bought they would take any coupon regardless.
so you could stock up on, say, expensive continental cheeses
or luxury bathroom products, whatever, anything,
and hand them loads of 20p-off coupons for completely different items.
barely spent a penny in there, happy days.

until we got greedy and overdid at easter.
cleared them out of top-brand choccy eggs with piles of vouchers for other things.
i think the manager got sacked,
we got banned and it all ended.
heigh-ho.
moved to hulme.
fun while it lasted.
 
Mifred said:
Sorry I think you posted on the thong thread
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cary-grant-stress.gif
 
Spurs quarter 69 said:
My dad would watch both teams at Maine Rd in the late 40s. He would go to Maine Rd one week OT the next in the 50s prior to his military service. It was common among his generation with away travel difficult and Saturday morning working. By the 60s he would only go to OT for the cricket and by the 80s hated them with a passion. There are places this still happens Forest fans will go on Notts County saving their animosity for Derby. Some of Blackpool mates happy to go on Fleetwood with me though less so in the last few years. Would feel much less animosity towards the rags if their fan base was solidly Mancunian
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Where was dad from. Mine came to Manchester from dundee in his late 20s
 
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