The minimum Metro fare for a short trip for up to three kilometres will be Dh1.80 if a passenger is using a prepaid card. It will cost Dh2 if the passenger uses a standard single journey paper ticket.

The maximum fare for a single journey will be Dh6.50 when using a paper ticket and Dh5.80 when using the card.

The fares will be valid for trains, public buses and the water buses for a single journey. This means a passenger using the metro can continue his or her trip on buses without paying any additional fare.

The Roads and Transport Authority has provided various fare options to passengers including daily and monthly passes.

The daily pass will cost Dh14 for unlimited trips on the metro and public buses all over the city. The monthly passes range from Dh100 to Dh270.

Dubai Metro

0

Redha Salman, the director of public health and safety at Dubai’s municipality has said that city officials have seized dozens of types of pills and purported health supplements from shops over concerns that they could be dangerous, according to the National. Salman said increased use of the supplements and pills, most of which are priced at less than $1.40, had triggered the move. ‘These products were confiscated as they claimed to be a medicine, which was not approved by the Ministry of Health,’ he said.

0

Egypt court sentences tycoon to death for Suzan Tamim murder

Cairo: A Cairo court on Thursday sentenced an Egyptian tycoon and a former policeman to death for the murder in Dubai last year of Lebanese pop star Suzan Tamim.

The judge ordered businessman Hesham Talaat Mustafa and retired policeman Mohseen Al Sukkari hanged for the brutal slaying of the singer in a luxury Dubai apartment in July, 2008.

0

Palm Jumeriah Monorail is now operational
click link to see the video coverage by gulfnews

Mono Rail

0

Property owners get six-month visit visas

ABU DHABI/ DUBAI — Foreign owners of property in the UAE will be able to stay in the country for six months with a renewable multiple entry visa under a decree issued by the Minister of Interior on Saturday.

The visa, tied to ownership of a completed property valued at Dh 1 million, had been expected after the government ordered a federal law on the issue when property companies promised residency visas with ownership. The resolution is effective immediately.

Property developers and investors on Saturday expected the visa to encourage foreign investment into the nation’s real estate sector but some said the law should have a longer time frame and should not be tied to a property value.

According to the amendment made to the residency law, the property owner and family can stay for six months from date of entry and then must return to his home country or a GCC state.

The property owner must also earn more than Dh10,000 a month and the property must also be ready to live in. The visa does not cover the owners of plots.

A Citibank report last year put Pakistanis and Iranians on the top of the list of foreign property buyers with a total of 37 per cent property ownership.

The visa will ease travel for investors from India, Pakistan, Iran and Russia, who had faced tighter visit visa rules. Now, they will be able to visit frequently to manage their properties. Passport holders from the US and Europe some Asian countries receive a visit visa upon arrival.

Syed Mohammed Ali, chief executive officer of the Fortune Group, a property developer based in Dubai, said that the policy initiative would boost the morale of investors, who were demoralised by a slump in property prices.

Finance professional Mohammed Azam said many property buyers sought to stay in the country for a long term.

“Those who want to buy property here or have already purchased property in the UAE want to stay here or whenever they wish they can come. Property life is about 20 to 30 years, while six months’ permission to stay is very less and won’t benefit the owners.”

1

Royals in UAE

0

UAE Vice President and Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai, HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, believes the worst of the financial crisis is now over, following its ’significant’ impact on the economy during the final quarter of 2008. Taking part in an electronic question and answer session with the press, he said the UAE economy is expected to grow this year, albeit only slightly.

Sheikh Mohammed said that the economy is in better shape than in many countries, so the ‘contraction it [the small and medium business sector] has suffered is only temporary.’

0

Duba:i One of the toughest moments in Dubai’s history came when Japanese scientists discovered how to culture pearls. The process devastated the economies of the Gulf region in the 1930s as the primary industry, diving for natural pearls, collapsed and depression in the US punctured demand. So the symmetry of Dubai seeking once again to become a pearl trading hub is apt just as the global credit crunch curbs the city-state’s financial and real estate sectors.

“Maybe there is some sentimentality here, but we do believe Dubai can once again become a pearl trading centre, even if it does not turn into a multibillion-dollar industry here,” says Ahmad Bin Sulayem, chairman of the Dubai Metals and Commodities Centre (DMCC).

0

The opening of the monorail on Palm Jumeirah in Dubai, which was slated for April 1, has been delayed to later this year, according to a Nakheel spokesperson. The new system, when operational, will carry passengers daily between Gateway Station at the trunk of The Palm and the Atlantis’ Aquaventure Station on the crescent with plans to ultimately connect to the Dubai Metro following the introduction of RTA’s Al Sufouh tramline, with direct links to Dubai Airport and other major transport hubs.

0

Dubai International airport has been given approval to operate in very low visibility conditions such as fog. The General Civil Aviation Authority and Dubai Civil Aviation Authority have approved the upgraded CATIIIB landing system, which means planes can operate in visibility conditions below 200 metres down to 50 metres. The first time a Middle East airport has been given this approval, it will help reduce passenger disruption during the months when fog is most common, airport officials said.

0

Collapse

0

The Gems group being highly connected to Rulers’ of UAE. Consder themselves Untouchables & above the law & policies of Govt.

Being leaders in Eduction-Business industry in UAE, Gems group is minting money by using diversified front companies.

recently at a meeting held by group of Parents of Our Own English High School it was revealed that the bus company which has the transportation contract is also under ownership of Directors of Gems group. The bus fee hike has multiplied several folds in past 24 months without any rhyme & reason. Parents are forced to comply or else take a TC. Who the people shall turn to, when the owners are connected to the TOP rulers of UAE.

In this crunch time after the collapse of almost 90% of UAE businesses the only booming business (for a while) is education. As soon as session ends, come Vacations, suffering parents will move OUT & send families back to home countries.

But who will put a tab on Gems Group… it is a million dollar question.

who will protect the parents and implement law & put a check on the schools & its transportation systems / contracts.

0

Don’t believe the Dubai hype; good or bad
Media follows fashion dictates. For many years, glossy magazine stories about the high life in Dubai were the only journalistic diet one could get. Now the tide has changed, and the flavour of the month is doom and gloom stories about Dubai the ghost town, where traffic suddenly moves freely and people leave unpaid-for cars at the airport with maxed-out credit cards in the glove compartment.
-
There is some justification for this: A recent HSBC report sees average price declines in real estate of 23% in Q4 2008. It is in line with anecdotal evidence and is more credible than another report by Colliers International, a real estate company, that speaks of 8% price declines over the same period. Even rents have started to come down after having been a major contributor to inflation over recent years.

Sales of so-called ‘off plan’ properties, that only required a down payment and were flipped many times before a single brick was laid, have come to a virtual standstill, as buyers recognise that leverage works on the upside, but it works on the downside as well. If many people cannot pay follow-up installments, they are forced to sell in a now illiquid market, or the developer gets back a foreclosed off-plan property without the possibility of reselling it to raise the remaining finances for completion of the project.

Dubai Freehold

0

Dubai employers make cuts as downturn deepens
An increasing number of companies in Dubai are announcing layoffs and adjusting their hiring and pay practices as the impact of financial crisis grows in the emirate.

Dubai’s booming economy has, in recent years, created millions of jobs and led to a hiring frenzy in which many employers were struggling to find talent.

In the first quarter of 2008, 306,000 work permits were issued to foreigners.

However, the story began to change in October, when Damac Properties cut 200 jobs, or 2.5% of its workforce.

Other companies quickly followed suit, including Nakheel, which sacked 500 employees, and Shuaa Capital, which cut 21 jobs, or 9% of its manpower.

‘The effects of the global financial crisis were delayed in reaching Dubai but there is no denying they are being felt today,’ says Rabea Ataya, CEO, Bayt.com, the largest job site in the Middle East.

‘The dramatic surge in recruitment activity seen early in 2008 as new sectors, particularly financial services and real estate, competed for top talent to fuel their growth, has abated significantly.’

‘Isolated problem’
Markus Wiesner, Managing director of Mercer Middle East, agrees that the financial crisis has hit certain sectors very hard, but says the problem has been relatively isolated and overall most companies are handling it by recruiting fewer employees or being more conservative on salary increases.

‘In Dubai, we are seeing a moderate slowdown in the growth curve rather than a complete stop or recession as in other countries. We are starting from a very high and aggressive growth level, so while yes, there has been a slowdown, this economy is not in a recession but has settled into a more moderate, or maybe a better word is more reasonable, growth rate right now.’

As the financial crisis has grown Bayt.com has received a dramatic increase in CVs at all career levels. The company has over two million CVs in its database, the bulk of which come from the GCC, Levant and North Africa.

About 20% are from outside the region, with the most noticeable spikes having been in CVs from the US and UK - particularly in the financial services and real estate sectors and amongst fresh graduates, especially MBAs.

In addition to an increase in quantity, there has been a noticeable increase in the quality of CVs, especially from overseas, as hiring activity in world capitals has shrunk.

Moreover, top talent has become more mobile in their job search and more amenable to considering employment opportunities in the GCC, which was already seeing a significant surge in interest from overseas talent even before the financial crisis, Ataya said.

Not surprisingly job listings have dropped noticeably on Bayt, but a main reason for this, Ataya says, is that employers are increasingly using the site’s search functionality to find talent rather than posting an advertisement for a position, which is a trend the company began to witness even before the financial crisis arose.

Companies prune workforce
With a surplus of talent on the market, many employers are ‘upgrading’ and hiring talent at levels they were previously unable to easily find and/or afford in the local markets, Ataya noted.

Wiesner agrees, saying companies have told him they hired many people over the last couple of years ‘just for the sake of recruiting to fill positions’, but in doing so felt they had to compromise on the quality of people they hired. Now these organisations are looking at the downturn as an opportunity to trim staff that may be underperforming, and keep those people that they want to hold on to in the long run, he said.

Companies will differ in their approach to dealing with the financial crisis. Multinational firms in Dubai are unlikely to change their benefit plans because - even though these packages are adjusted to the local market - the plans are relatively standard across the company’s worldwide locations. Instead, these companies are more likely to cut salaries and bonuses.

‘Local companies, on the other hand, might adjust both pay and benefits, but usually the first to go is bonuses, and then - in this region - they are more likely to freeze, rather than cut back, on salaries,’ Wiesner said.

Wait-and-see approach
Many companies say they are still evaluating the situation.

‘A lot of our clients are taking a wait a see and approach. They tell us they see no immediate need to lay off people or cut salaries, but the situation may look different a year from now. We will see over the next 6-12 months the real effect of the downturn, particularly on Dubai and its economy.’

One fact of life that employees should expect is that salaries will remain relatively flat for the time being. ‘Recently we had high inflation - up to 14% - and pay increases that were close to that figure but not 100% keeping up.

‘So what I expect this year is lower inflation and lower pay increases justified by the global financial situation. Again we will hear similar complaints from employees this year because of the situation in terms of the percentage growth versus inflation is similar to what it was last year,’ Wiesner said.

Another trend that employees are likely to see is more pay packages based on performance. ‘We have quite a lot of organisations coming to us looking at more performance-related payment schemes, but I would not say that this is particularly driven by the current economic situation.

‘This is a general cultural change that has been happening here over the past two to three years, where organisations are looking for payment structures with higher bonuses relative to salaries. I think organizations now have a stronger incentive to go down that route,’ he noted.

0

UAE - 2000 EMPLOYMENT VISAS CANCELLED DAILY

Uncertainty among Indian expats in the UAE is reaching maddening heights as jobs vanish by the day. An average of 1,500 to 2,000 visas are cancelled in the white collar sector every day, according to an analyst with a leading Dubai firm.

Schools are flooded with applications for transfer certificate as families get ready to return home. There would be an exodus to India by March.

Though there are only a total of 3,200 declared job losses by seven companies in Dubai, estimates from market sources put this at 20,000.

Unofficial figures hint at 30,000 white collar jobs lost in the past three months. This is in addition to the tens of thousands of labourers rendered jobless every week.

Sudhir Kumar Azhakath, Partner & Head of Corporate Communications and Public Relations, Morison Menon Chartered Accountants, a leading audit firm in the West Asia, told Express that companies were re-evaluating strategies and restructuring resources to cope up with the global and local challenges.

Most of the companies have stopped giving pink slip figures as it might land them in trouble with the Ministry of Labour.

Emirates NBD (merged entity of Emirates Bank International and National Bank of Dubai) had fired 1,800 employees.

Another 1,700 pink slips are in the pipeline.

This means 32 percent of a total workforce of 11,000 would be jobless in what the company terms ’shedding of extra fat.’ Standard Chartered had cut 500, HSBC 250 and ADCB 750.

One major Indian school has a got transfer certificate applications for 900 students till last week, which is 10 percent of the school’s student population.

There are more than 10 major Indian schools in Dubai alone.

This is due to various reasons including job loss, high cost of living and tuition fees and high rentals.

The proposal to raise the minimum salary to 10,000 Dirhams for family visa status would make it impossible for a large chunk of expatriates to retain their families in the UAE. A recommendation to this effect has already gone from the Federal National Council to the Federal Government.

Sudhir Kumar warned that by March/April there will be a huge flow of Indian expatriates. “Out of this 70 percent will be Keralites going back for good or deciding to stay alone and send their families for good.

And there are a lot of other expatriates who will also be moving out - Pakistani, Egyptian, Sri Lankan, UK, Germany etc. Recently 70 UK expatriates left their luxury cars in the airport and left the country. And more than 100 expatriates from India and other countries left similarly.

It is officially estimated that Dubai’s 2008 population of 1.3 million will come down by 8 percent this year. But according to me it will go down by more than 25 percent.”

0