During Khalifa's 18th reign,
Development of the UAE
It's like a rocket booster.
Author: Jiali Chen
Editor: Rui Su
On the 13th local time, UAE President Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan died at the age of 73.
The UAE Ministry of Presidential Affairs announced a 40-day state funeral for President Khalifa and lowered its flags to half-mast nationwide as a sign of mourning. UAE government agencies, federal and local agencies, and the private sector will suspend work for 3 days.
During his reign, Khalifa made a significant contribution to the economic and social development of the UAE. Forbes magazine called him "controlling hundreds of billions of barrels of crude oil reserves and more than $800 billion in sovereign funds, rich on the one hand, but low-key.
The father's most important son
Khalifa is the second president of the UAE and the richest of the 7 emirates, the Abu Dhabi chief.
Born in 1948, he was the eldest son of Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan and had been with his father since childhood. "My father taught me too much. Of course, the most important thing is to be patient enough in the face of difficulties. He later recalled.
Fifty years ago, the elder Zayed, with the support of his family and Britain, staged a peaceful coup d'état to depose former sheikh Bout and begin his role as chief of Abu Dhabi.
He led the family to relocate to Abu Dhabi. At his initiative, the United Arab Emirates was formally established on 2 December 1971 and Zayed was elected as its first president.
Khalifa's father, Zayed.
Khalifa has always been highly regarded by his father, becoming the chief executive of the eastern region of Abu Dhabi at the age of 18 and being officially crowned crown prince at the age of 21, as well as the minister of defence.
Khalifa has since shown extraordinary leadership, making leaps and bounds by developing a small unit of the Ministry of Defence into a multi-purpose unit with advanced equipment.
Khalifa (medium)
Since the 1980s, Khalifa has been at the "lifeblood of the nation" as chairman of the Oil Committee, overseeing Abu Dhabi's oil and gas industry. At the same time, he actively encourages economic diversification rather than relying solely on the oil and gas industry.
On November 2, 2004, the elder Zayed died of illness. The next day, the UAE's Federal Supreme Council met and unanimously elected Abu Dhabi's new sheikh, Khalifa, as the new uae's president.
Khalifa in his youth.
Helping the UAE to enter the fast lane
After Khalifa came to power, he became politically stable and old, and continued to pursue his father's policy, because this was in the national interest of the UAE and conducive to stabilizing the regime;
Economically, he proposed a diversified economic development strategy, advocating the construction and sustainable development of modern infrastructure, rather than just being attached to the oil industry.
In terms of cultural development, he stressed the need to strengthen cultural education and social identity.
During his tenure, the UAE seemed to be equipped with rocket boosters, and the pace of development was changing rapidly. The most obvious and intuitive changes are in land area and population.
The uae's population was estimated at 4 million in 2004 and currently exceeds 10 million. In addition, Abu Dhabi and Dubai have expanded outwards, creating suburbs such as Arabian Ranches, Greentown and Khalifa City, which in 2004 were all deserts.
Khalifa
At the same time, in the international community, Khalifa has followed his father's usual policy of friendship and assistance, constantly bringing the UAE, a small Middle Eastern country, to the forefront.
During the turmoil in Iraq, Khalifa helped rebuild its economy by providing diplomatic assistance, while calling on different segments of Iraqi society to strengthen national unity through dialogue, agreement and cooperation.
On 28 October 2015, the UAE was elected to the United Nations Human Rights Council.
In 2019, the FIFA Club World Cup and the World Para Olympic Games in Abu Dhabi put the UAE in the spotlight of the world.
In 2020, Dubai hosted the World Expo, which has also become an indelible and wonderful chapter in the history of the UAE.
The rich side is unusually low-key
In terms of the means of getting rich, Khalifa is well versed. In 1976, he formed the Abu Dhabi Investment Agency, which oversees financial investments to create a stable source of income.
He is said to be worth more than $10 billion, the fourth-richest royal family in the world after the King of Thailand, the Sultan of Brunei and the King of Saudi Arabia.
There are many legends about his wealthy life, such as his own superyacht of about 200 meters long, which is the world's largest private yacht.
In 2020, part of Khalifa's property was exposed because of a lawsuit. He allegedly owned as many as 140 properties in London alone, with a total value of nearly £5.5 billion.
With a wealth of personal assets in his hands, he never hesitated to use his money on the edge of the knife. During his tenure, he personally funded Dubai through the 2008 financial crisis. The Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest building in Dubai, is named after him.
Burj Khalifa
In his private life, Khalifa had always been accustomed to keeping a low profile. Unlike the international divorce case of Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, the vice president of the United Arab Emirates and the sheikh of Dubai, Khalifa has only one wife exposed, and there is very little information outside the photos.
Khalifa's wife.
After 2014, Khalifa gradually withdrew from public activities because of a stroke that was not as good as before. His half-brother, 59-year-old Mohammed bin Zayed (pictured below left), as crown prince, and Vice President Mohammed bin Rashid (pictured below, right), the sheikh of Dubai, began taking charge of most of the UAE's affairs.
However, the UAE's major decisions are still inseparable from the shadow of Khalifa, such as the first female judge in the UAE in 2020, which was signed by Khalifa himself.
He was last seen in public in May 2020. Khalifa, then 72, made a rare appearance to thank the frontline medical staff fighting the epidemic.
During his 18-year reign, Khalifa has ushered the UAE into a whole new era that will always be remembered.
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