The Abu Dhabi power broker facing his toughest test at Manchester City

An independent commission has found Manchester City guilty of all but one of the 115 Premier League charges against it. It ruled that the club used "sham" sponsorships and contracts to inflate revenues and understate costs by £900mn. City says it is innocent and will appeal. The verdict lands on chairman Khaldoon al-Mubarak, who also runs Abu Dhabi's $385bn Mubadala fund and oversees a £30bn UAE investment partnership with Britain. Prime Minister Andy Burnham has warned of damage to "Brand UK", so the fallout now reaches past football to the reputation of an emirate that has used City to raise its global profile..By Chloe Cornish.Khaldoon al-Mubarak rarely appears ruffled. One of Abu Dhabi’s most powerful non-royals, he straddles global finance, diplomacy and football with a polished assurance that mirrors the emirate’s meticulously managed image.But Mubarak has never hidden his frustration over the Premier League’s probe into Manchester City’s finances, an eight-year saga that has cast a shadow over the club’s transformation from mid-table laggards to a trophy-winning machine since Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed al-Nahyan bought it in 2008. The league’s announcement this week that City had been found guilty of all but one of the 115 charges it was facing has plunged the club into crisis.An independent commission found that City had used “sham” sponsorship agreements and contracts to massage its accounts, inflating its revenues and understating costs by £900mn. City maintains it is innocent and will appeal against the verdict.Now Mubarak must defend both an asset that has become one of the emirate’s most successful soft-power projects and his own reputation, as his stewardship of the club comes under intense scrutiny. “There remain many who want to undermine the momentum of our club,” he wrote in a defiant open letter on Saturday, becoming the first person from City to speak out on the matter. “We will not give them that opportunity.” City is just one part of Mubarak’s vast remit.As group chief executive of Mubadala, he is the world’s longest-serving head of a sovereign investment fund and one of the key figures overseeing oil-rich Abu Dhabi’s more than $1.5tn in wealth.He also handles critical diplomatic relationships, including with China, and chairs the Executive Affairs Authority, an advisory body to United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, Sheikh Mansour’s brother. When Abu Dhabi was given a seat on Donald Trump’s Board of Peace this year, Mubarak was chosen as its representative. “The power he holds is massive,” said one executive at a large global investment firm. “But he does it from behind the scenes.”The son of a senior Emirati diplomat who was assassinated in Paris when Mubarak was eight, he comes from a family of religious and judicial experts who served in government and were close to Abu Dhabi’s ruling Nahyan family.After his father’s death, he grew up partly in the royal palace, later moving to Boston to study at Tufts University before returning to work at Abu Dhabi’s national oil company. Mubarak was soon among the officials entrusted by Sheikh Mohamed with implementing his ambitious plans for Abu Dhabi. In 2002 he was selected to lead the newly founded Mubadala Development Company, which was charged with helping diversify Abu Dhabi’s oil-dependent economy and investing its hydrocarbon wealth in new industries and infrastructure. Fifteen years later it merged with Sheikh Mansour’s larger International Petroleum Investment Company, which had become embroiled in Malaysia’s 1MDB scandal, before adding another wealth fund, the Abu Dhabi Investment Council, a year later.As chief executive of the enlarged group, renamed Mubadala Investment Company and chaired by Sheikh Mansour, Mubarak now heads Abu Dhabi’s second-biggest sovereign fund, which manages $385bn and is one of the world’s most active dealmakers. He “is someone whose word you can trust”, said Bayo Ogunlesi, chair and CEO of BlackRock-owned Global Infrastructure Partners, adding that Mubarak had “remained centred and treats everyone with respect”. As Mubarak’s prominence in international investing has grown, so has the rest of his portfolio, with many in the UAE now regarding him as more powerful than most ministers.“His responsibility has transcended way beyond finance,” said Diego López, founder and managing director of Global SWF, an industry tracker.Kristian Ulrichsen, fellow for the Middle East at the Baker Institute, described Mubarak as “suave”, “very articulate” and “incredibly capable”, saying “that’s why he’s been given so many portfolios”.Mohamed Alabbar, managing director of Dubai property developer Emaar, said he had seen Mubarak in “many, many situations . . . He’s a good human being . . . he’s light-hearted, he’s funny, he’s probably the best friend you can get if you are lucky. And he’s clean.”During a career tied to Abu Dhabi’s development, Mubarak has taken on projects from bringing nuclear power to the Gulf region to building a Formula 1 circuit while largely avoiding personal association with controversies that have dogged the emirate.These range from the 1MDB scandal to claims that the UAE has armed a faction in Sudan’s civil war that the US has accused of genocide, allegations that Abu Dhabi had repeatedly denied. But his role at City has made him Abu Dhabi’s most recognisable non-royal. While Sheikh Mansour has stayed in the shadows, Mubarak has been the public face of the club’s transformation into a footballing powerhouse — a regular fixture at the Etihad Stadium who has lifted trophies as City won eight Premier League titles as well as the Champions League.He has repeatedly rejected allegations of wrongdoing by the club. But the trust placed in him by supporters, players and team managers will now be tested by the details of alleged misconduct set out by the commission — and by whether City can overturn the decision on appeal.Supporters and figures associated with City have rallied round the club. Pep Guardiola, head coach from 2016 until this summer, wrote on social media on Wednesday that he was and “always will be behind my club, my owner, my chairman”.Consequences for UK industry from any breakdown in relations could be serious. The UAE has committed £30bn under a sovereign investment partnership with the UK, overseen by Mubarak.British Prime Minister Andy Burnham said on Wednesday that the matter could have an impact on both the Premier League and “Brand UK”, adding that he would be “really concerned” if the UAE, which had been “a huge partner in the building of modern Manchester”, ultimately decided to sell the club.Ulrichsen said the reputational impact could be worse than that of previous controversies involving the emirate.“This will probably go global in a way that nothing else has and will associate Abu Dhabi with a club that was systematically cheating,” he said.Mubarak must manage the fallout at a time when Abu Dhabi’s ambitions to become the destination of choice for the global elite and an internationally significant finance hub are being complicated by the US-Israel war with Iran..Read more:.Man City challenges the Premier League as football’s financial arms race goes nuclear: Matthew Brooker.The stakes also extend to Abu Dhabi itself. Although the emirate insists Sheikh Mansour’s investment in the club was private, Mubarak has previously acknowledged that City’s performance and conduct would reflect on the emirate as it embarked on its huge development plans and sought to project itself on the global stage.“[H]ow we are handling this project is telling a lot to the world about how we are,” Mubarak told The Guardian in 2009. “This is showing the world the true essence of who Abu Dhabi is and what Abu Dhabi is about.” .© 2026 The Financial Times Ltd..Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox every morning on weekdays. Register here.Support South Africa's bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here.If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here.

The Abu Dhabi power broker facing his toughest test at Manchester City

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