Mohamed Alabbar of Emaar Properties said it is targeting more project wins this year. Victor Besa for The National
Mohamed Alabbar of Emaar Properties said it is targeting more project wins this year. Victor Besa for The National
Mohamed Alabbar of Emaar Properties said it is targeting more project wins this year. Victor Besa for The National
Mohamed Alabbar of Emaar Properties said it is targeting more project wins this year. Victor Besa for The National

Emaar keeps focus on growth at annual general meeting


Michael Fahy
  • English
  • Arabic

The Emaar Properties chairman Mohamed Alabbar has said that its board will continue to place pressure on its management to deliver profitable growth.

Opening the company’s annual general meeting with a PowerPoint slide showing how it had beaten profit targets for two out of the past three years, and that the cumulative three-year figure was 5.6 per cent ahead of target, Mr Alabbar said the company plans to repeat the exercise for the next three years, but did not give details of the new targets as they were not ready.

He said that when Emaar first revealed its three-year targets, its board were asked why they had done it.

“I think the answer we got from the board was that we like to put pressure on ourselves, we like to put pressure on management. I’m happy to share it with you just to say that this is what we promised and this is where we’ve got.”

The slide showed that the company beat projected profit figures in 2014, when profit achieved was 6.4 per cent higher than the board had requested. Its profit in 2015 was 18.9 per cent higher than forecast, but the 2016 figure was 3.4 per cent lower than the target.

“I think 2016, if it wasn’t for our contractors’ performance, who are really suffering, to deliver our projects on time we could have achieved that number, Mr Alabbar said.

“I promise you that the board and management are looking for ... the same type of growth for the next three years – just to put more pressure on everybody.”

Shareholders approved all of the resolutions on the agenda, including a special resolution setting up a new employee incentive scheme that will grant up to 50 million shares per year at a par value of Dh1 per share to qualifying members.

However, during the meeting a number of shareholders pressed the board to distribute more of its properties through dividends, although a 15 fils per share cash issue was approved.

“Hopefully, in a month, or even nearer than that, you will see that we will be achieving projects and you will see other news that we have won an important project that our financial position has allowed us to [undertake],” Mr Alabbar said.

mfahy@thenational.ae

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Profile of VoucherSkout

Date of launch: November 2016

Founder: David Tobias

Based: Jumeirah Lake Towers

Sector: Technology

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Stage: Embarking on a Series A round to raise $5 million in the first quarter of 2019 with a 20 per cent stake

Investors: Seed round was self-funded with “millions of dollars” 

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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets

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Cricket World Cup League 2 Fixtures

Saturday March 5, UAE v Oman, ICC Academy (all matches start at 9.30am)

Sunday March 6, Oman v Namibia, ICC Academy

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UAE squad

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Brazil – $287 million

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Attacks on Egypt’s long rooted Copts

Egypt’s Copts belong to one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, with Mark the Evangelist credited with founding their church around 300 AD. Orthodox Christians account for the overwhelming majority of Christians in Egypt, with the rest mainly made up of Greek Orthodox, Catholics and Anglicans.

The community accounts for some 10 per cent of Egypt’s 100 million people, with the largest concentrations of Christians found in Cairo, Alexandria and the provinces of Minya and Assiut south of Cairo.

Egypt’s Christians have had a somewhat turbulent history in the Muslim majority Arab nation, with the community occasionally suffering outright persecution but generally living in peace with their Muslim compatriots. But radical Muslims who have first emerged in the 1970s have whipped up anti-Christian sentiments, something that has, in turn, led to an upsurge in attacks against their places of worship, church-linked facilities as well as their businesses and homes.

More recently, ISIS has vowed to go after the Christians, claiming responsibility for a series of attacks against churches packed with worshippers starting December 2016.

The discrimination many Christians complain about and the shift towards religious conservatism by many Egyptian Muslims over the last 50 years have forced hundreds of thousands of Christians to migrate, starting new lives in growing communities in places as far afield as Australia, Canada and the United States.

Here is a look at major attacks against Egypt's Coptic Christians in recent years:

November 2: Masked gunmen riding pickup trucks opened fire on three buses carrying pilgrims to the remote desert monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor south of Cairo, killing 7 and wounding about 20. IS claimed responsibility for the attack.

May 26, 2017: Masked militants riding in three all-terrain cars open fire on a bus carrying pilgrims on their way to the Monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor, killing 29 and wounding 22. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack.

April 2017Twin attacks by suicide bombers hit churches in the coastal city of Alexandria and the Nile Delta city of Tanta. At least 43 people are killed and scores of worshippers injured in the Palm Sunday attack, which narrowly missed a ceremony presided over by Pope Tawadros II, spiritual leader of Egypt Orthodox Copts, in Alexandria's St. Mark's Cathedral. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks.

February 2017: Hundreds of Egyptian Christians flee their homes in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula, fearing attacks by ISIS. The group's North Sinai affiliate had killed at least seven Coptic Christians in the restive peninsula in less than a month.

December 2016A bombing at a chapel adjacent to Egypt's main Coptic Christian cathedral in Cairo kills 30 people and wounds dozens during Sunday Mass in one of the deadliest attacks carried out against the religious minority in recent memory. ISIS claimed responsibility.

July 2016Pope Tawadros II says that since 2013 there were 37 sectarian attacks on Christians in Egypt, nearly one incident a month. A Muslim mob stabs to death a 27-year-old Coptic Christian man, Fam Khalaf, in the central city of Minya over a personal feud.

May 2016: A Muslim mob ransacks and torches seven Christian homes in Minya after rumours spread that a Christian man had an affair with a Muslim woman. The elderly mother of the Christian man was stripped naked and dragged through a street by the mob.

New Year's Eve 2011A bomb explodes in a Coptic Christian church in Alexandria as worshippers leave after a midnight mass, killing more than 20 people.

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Abu Dhabi – Call 999 or 8002626 (Aman Service)

Dubai – Call 800243

Sharjah – Call 065632222

Ras Al Khaimah - Call 072053372

Ajman – Call 067401616

Umm Al Quwain – Call 999

Fujairah - Call 092051100 or 092224411

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Started: November 2017

Founders: Mounir Nakhla, Ahmed Mohsen and Mohamed Aboulnaga

Based: Cairo, Egypt

Sector: transport and logistics

Size: 150 employees

Investment: approximately $8 million

Investors include: Singapore’s Battery Road Digital Holdings, Egypt’s Algebra Ventures, Uber co-founder and former CTO Oscar Salazar

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Day 4, Abu Dhabi Test: At a glance

Moment of the day Not much was expected – on Sunday or ever – of Hasan Ali as a batsman. And yet he lit up the late overs of the Pakistan innings with a happy cameo of 29 from 25 balls. The highlight was when he launched a six right on top of the netting above the Pakistan players’ viewing area. He was out next ball.

Stat of the day – 1,358 There were 1,358 days between Haris Sohail’s previous first-class match and his Test debut for Pakistan. The lack of practice in the multi-day format did not show, though, as the left-hander made an assured half-century to guide his side through a potentially damaging collapse.

The verdict As is the fashion of Test matches in this country, the draw feels like a dead-cert, before a clatter of wickets on the fourth afternoon puts either side on red alert. With Yasir Shah finding prodigious turn now, Pakistan will be confident of bowling Sri Lanka out. Whether they have enough time to do so and chase the runs required remains to be seen.