By now it reads like some rambunctious farce, this passage dated December 22, from Tunisia Online News: "President Ben Ali was reserved a warm and enthusiastic welcome by the citizens and sportspeople who attended national champion Oussama Mellouli's welcome ceremony, chanting long life to Tunisia and its President and voicing consideration and gratitude to the Head of State for the success Tunisia is constantly achieving in all sectors, notably in sports, thanks to the sound national choices."
That was a Wednesday, fewer than 72 hours after Mellouli had used the Fina World Swimming Championships in Dubai to cement his mastery of the 1,500m freestyle.
He had churned through the dreamy-blue water of the new Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Sports Complex easily ahead of Denmark's silver medallist Mads Glaesner and Hungary's bronze medallist Gergely Gyurta.
He had previously won the 1,500 in the 2008 Summer Olympics, where two herniated discs had not derailed his trek to becoming the first African male gold-medallist in an individual Olympic swimming event. Back then in Beijing, the shock win from a swimmer fresh from an 18-month doping suspension had ended a four-Olympics Australian dynasty in the 1,500 and led Mellouli to proclaim "redemption".
By December in Dubai, his widely expected win had come in 14mins 24.19secs, and he had upheld his bold utterance of days earlier: "I'm just playing around with the 200 free and 400 IM [individual medley] before I get to swim my own event."
His play-around 200 freestyle had brought him bronze, his play-around 400 IM had brought silver and some added playing around in the 400 free wrung another bronze.
A giddy Tunisian cheering section swooned in Dubai. Soon, an appreciative crowd formed in Tunis, as the report noted: "As part of his encouragements to sportspeople to excel and hoist high Tunisia's flag in international events, President Ben Ali headed on Wednesday to Tunis-Carthage International Airport to welcome Olympic champion Oussama Mellouli."
Two mornings before Mellouli swam that 1,500 in Dubai and five mornings before he met President Zine el Abidine Ben Ali at the airport, authorities in the central Tunisian city of Sidi Bouzid confiscated the wares of the 26-year-old vegetable vendor Mohamed Bouazizi. When Bouazizi's formal complaints at the necessary offices went unheeded, he set himself afire in front outside the regional governor's office.
His act and his death 18 days later have gained note as a historic buoy, as the moment that sowed the protests that ousted Ben Ali 23 days after something so pristine as beaming over a swimmer at an airport, and as the moment that rippled eventually into rallies across North Africa and beyond, even toppling a head of state as entrenched as Egypt's Hosni Mubarak.
In an interview this weekend with Karen Crouse of the New York Times, Mellouli, 27, spoke with awe of the Tunisian people. He said he had followed raptly the events of late December and early January largely from Los Angeles, the site of his alma mater, the University of Southern California. He said he always reckoned change would come but felt marvel at its haste.
He said that, through the years, government officials had telephoned his father on occasion to query as to why Ous sometimes had not given homage or dedicated medals to the president in post-victory remarks. Thereby did he supply a glimpse into one of the world's curious little caste systems, the very idea that a powerful head of state might crave endorsement from an athlete.
They say sport is a microcosm of life, or is it the other way around?
And then, Mellouli also has forged quite a binge lately, winning five USA Swimming Grand Prix Circuit events in less than one month, claiming outright the 400 IM and 400 freestyle at Indianapolis last week and finishing second to Michael Phelps in the 200m freestyle, which is rather like finishing first in the human division.
At an event in Missouri last month, he spoke of his pride in the Tunisians, and to Crouse he allowed for the possibility that the events in his homeland might have lent him added oomph.
All that, just a blip in time after his duties as a leading national sportsman included meeting the president of his country at the airport. As sport gives just another little window on to the brisk speed of history this time around, the account of that meeting suddenly reads like some ancient script from some other time.
It was, after all, 74 days ago.
cculpepper@thenational.ae
The specs
Engine: 8.0-litre, quad-turbo 16-cylinder
Transmission: 7-speed auto
0-100kmh 2.3 seconds
0-200kmh 5.5 seconds
0-300kmh 11.6 seconds
Power: 1500hp
Torque: 1600Nm
Price: Dh13,400,000
On sale: now
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
Museum of the Future in numbers
- 78 metres is the height of the museum
- 30,000 square metres is its total area
- 17,000 square metres is the length of the stainless steel facade
- 14 kilometres is the length of LED lights used on the facade
- 1,024 individual pieces make up the exterior
- 7 floors in all, with one for administrative offices
- 2,400 diagonally intersecting steel members frame the torus shape
- 100 species of trees and plants dot the gardens
- Dh145 is the price of a ticket
Know your cyber adversaries
Cryptojacking: Compromises a device or network to mine cryptocurrencies without an organisation's knowledge.
Distributed denial-of-service: Floods systems, servers or networks with information, effectively blocking them.
Man-in-the-middle attack: Intercepts two-way communication to obtain information, spy on participants or alter the outcome.
Malware: Installs itself in a network when a user clicks on a compromised link or email attachment.
Phishing: Aims to secure personal information, such as passwords and credit card numbers.
Ransomware: Encrypts user data, denying access and demands a payment to decrypt it.
Spyware: Collects information without the user's knowledge, which is then passed on to bad actors.
Trojans: Create a backdoor into systems, which becomes a point of entry for an attack.
Viruses: Infect applications in a system and replicate themselves as they go, just like their biological counterparts.
Worms: Send copies of themselves to other users or contacts. They don't attack the system, but they overload it.
Zero-day exploit: Exploits a vulnerability in software before a fix is found.
THE SPECS
Engine: 3.5-litre supercharged V6
Power: 416hp at 7,000rpm
Torque: 410Nm at 3,500rpm
Transmission: 6-speed manual
Fuel consumption: 10.2 l/100km
Price: Dh375,000
On sale: now
Where can I submit a sample?
Volunteers can now submit DNA samples at a number of centres across Abu Dhabi. The programme is open to all ages.
Collection centres in Abu Dhabi include:
- Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre (ADNEC)
- Biogenix Labs in Masdar City
- Al Towayya in Al Ain
- NMC Royal Hospital in Khalifa City
- Bareen International Hospital
- NMC Specialty Hospital, Al Ain
- NMC Royal Medical Centre - Abu Dhabi
- NMC Royal Women’s Hospital.
Emergency
Director: Kangana Ranaut
Stars: Kangana Ranaut, Anupam Kher, Shreyas Talpade, Milind Soman, Mahima Chaudhry
Rating: 2/5
