The UAE's Tolerance Degree

 March 2021

The above headline appeared in the Khaleej Times on Thursday the 11th of March.

Hypocrisy comes in many forms, but the UAE probably does it better than any nation on earth. In the weeks following, the dramatic and heart-breaking news viewed worldwide from Princess Latifa Al Maktoum. She described her kidnapping and illegal detention and her older sister's terrible plight. The UAE refused to respond to a plethora of request from world leaders for an explanation. The United Nations made a formal demand for the most basic proof of life. The reply, an intolerant no.

The UAE seeks to fool the world yet again with utter nonsense in an attempt to appear tolerant and kind. Sheik Mohammed, The Prime minister of the UAE, goes to extraordinary lengths to deceive and trick the world. The former president of Ireland, Mary Robinson, in a recent television interview, described how an elaborate hoax made a fool of her, describing it as the biggest mistake of her political career.

Dubai and its Rulers are the most perfidious and cruel leaders who lord themselves over a draconian police state. Freedom of speech, gender and racial equality are ruthlessly suppressed, and slavery is legal. Condoleezza Rice, in her memoirs, noted that whenever there was a global disaster, the petty-bourgeois state in the Gulf would be the first and the nosiest about committing large sums for humanitarian aid, which famously never materialize

Dubai and the despot ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, are responsible for the imprisonment, inhumane and degrading treatments of thousands of ex-pat and migrant workers who are lured to the sunshine states in the Arabian Gulf only to find their lives shattered. Dubai and its ruling classes are the most duplicitous characters in the region. Dubai is prepared to imprison its Royal Children, two beautiful adult women, in full view of the world's press is the most unambiguous indication of the regime's brutality.

I was taught that charity begins at home. The Maktoum's should take a good look at their own house before they attempt to lure more innocents into their evil web of corruption. The illegal detention of women should be addressed before offering degree courses to the world on tolerance. The irrefutable evidence on the Rulers' behaviour cannot be ignored, and academics worldwide should make a stand on the issue and not endorse the hypocrisy.

The Mohamed Bin Zayed University for Humanities announced the launch of the one-of-a-kind degree programme, with courses starting in September 2021. Students must be told if halfway through the degree course, any unforeseen change of fortune and failure to meet the course fees will lead to detention in the UAE and ultimately to a lengthy spell in the most inhumane of prisons should they fail to pay their outstanding fees. Will this information be in the course prospectus on tolerance?

Black lives do not matter in Dubai. That is clear; the writer has experienced this first-hand. The draconian legal system enforced in the Gulf states is both medieval and unjust. Sentencing is relative to gender and race. Death penalties are on offer to an unreliable and corrupt judiciary. The police regularly use torture; it is the primary investigative tool. Torture is proven worldwide to be an unreliable method of gathering evidence, and confessions under duress are unreliable.

A tolerance degree would be a useful course if the ruling classes were the students. Dubai has per capita the highest arrest and detention rates in the world. Their jails are full of people convicted on unreliable evidence or for debt. They are one of the few remaining countries in the world that operates a debtor's prison. There is no tolerance for business failure and no tolerance for alternative opinion, race or lifestyle.

There is no tolerance for criticism of the regime or its policies. There is no tolerance for Human Rights. There is no tolerance for homosexuality, lesbian, transgender identity or same-sex marriages. There is no tolerance. Dubai is a dangerous police state dressed up in a pretty frock.

Martin Lonergan / Peter Margetts

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