This ambition is reflected in everything from Dubai’s breathtaking modernistic architecture and multi-billion dollar real estate developments to its leaders’ huge investments in horse racing and soon motorsport. To make the DIFC work as a hub for investment bankers and other specialised financiers, the centre was always going to have to be judged on the superior levels of governance it could achieve, as well as its architectural glitz. This is what gave such apparent importance to the dismissal, in June, of the project’s two senior expatriate regulators – who had been appointed to advise on governance practices in the Emirates.
PR fiasco
