Can Qatar or Abu Dhabi really usurp Dubai as the best place to work in the Gulf?
Let battle commence – Dubai has looked up from its debt troubles to realise it has some serious challengers to its position as the region’s leading financial centre. But can it manage to convince financial services firms to recruit in significant numbers again? The popular perception of Dubai as, according to one headhunter, “a Clint Eastwood film set with brushwood running down the streets” is, of course, a fallacy and has largely come about because of the drawn-out Dubai World debt fiasco. Things are looking up a bit on that front anyway – Moody’s has just confirmed a stable outlook for DP World. And the DIFC now looks in a fighting mood; having finally conceded that it may need to reduce the cost of doing business in the free zone, it’s also re-hired Marwan Lutfi (who helped create the finance hub in 2004) as deputy chief executive to drive its “next phase of growth”. It faces some real threats. The possible merger between the Dubai and Abu Dhabi exchange could prove significant in
