Abu Dhabi May Wrest Power from Dubai

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"It was just a general assumption," Turner told Bloomberg TV on Dec. 8. "It's how business is done in Dubai. One does not push the government for specific pieces of paper."

Sheikh Mohammed's public image suggests a man of action more than a paper-pusher.

Endurance City

He often spends weekends racing horses at Endurance City, a desert course 30 minutes from the city center. As he and his son, Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, speed away, an entourage of white four-by-fours drives alongside, the occupants waving and cheering. The course has chalets for friends and family to eat and relax after each race leg.

At Sheikh Mohammed's Zabeel Palace in Dubai, a statue of white horses greets visitors and pheasants walk the grounds. The sheikh holds dinners there to break the Ramadan fast, cracking jokes and quoting his own poetry to guests.

He often attends thoroughbred auctions in Newmarket, England, to add to his stable of racehorses, the world's largest. In October, wearing reading glasses, a blue cap and MBT trainers, he flicked through sales catalogues and spoke to his bloodstock advisers, sometimes wandering into the auction ring when his agent was bidding.

Low Returns

Sheikh Mohammed's returns were the lowest among the 18 biggest buyers of one-year-old thoroughbreds at U.S. auctions from 2004 to 2006, according to data compiled by The Blood-Horse MarketWatch.

Sheikh Mohammed, 60, says speed is central to his governing style, and cites the influence of his father, Sheik Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum, who died in 1990.

"I follow his example," Sheikh Mohammed says on his Web site. "He would rise early and go alone to watch what was happening on each of his projects. I do the same. I watch. I read faces. I take decisions and I move fast. Full throttle."

Abu Dhabi's rulers are more inclined to apply the brakes.

Sheikh Khalifa, born in 1948, is "more your typical sphinx-like ruler who's well-respected but doesn't say much in public," Krane said.

He has become known in the world of philanthropy. Sheikh Khalifa is donating an undisclosed sum to fund a cardiovascular and critical-care building for Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.

Crown Prince

The gift came after Johns Hopkins had treated U.A.E. patients, including members of the royal family, for two decades, and is "among the most significant Hopkins has received," Hopkins Medicine magazine Dome reported in June 2007. A hospital spokesman said President Ronald Peterson wasn't available to comment.

Sheikh Khalifa's younger brother, Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, who hosted an April 2007 ceremony for Johns Hopkins officials in Abu Dhabi, is a key decision-maker there and more inclined to emulate Dubai's global glitter, Krane said.

Abu Dhabi is building branches of the Louvre and Guggenheim museums, and held its first Formula One Grand Prix last month at a new desert racetrack. Beyonce and Aerosmith played at the closing concert.

Abu Dhabi's rescue helped pare losses on the region's stock market. Still, Dubai's benchmark DFM General Index is down 9.6 percent, while Abu Dhabi's index has fallen 2.5 percent, since the Nov. 25 announcement.

Sheikh Mohammed said at the Merrill conference on Nov. 9 that anyone who doubted the solidarity of Abu Dhabi and Dubai should "shut up." Two months earlier, he sparked a local market rally by telling reporters at the Zabeel Palace: "We are all right, the U.A.E. is all right, and we are not worried" about debt payments.

"In the last few months his statements have been misleading at best, actually quite duplicitous," Davidson said. "How do you recover from that? I'm not sure you can. And I'm not sure Abu Dhabi wants him to."

To contact the reporter on this story: Ben Holland in Istanbul at bholland1@bloomberg.net.

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