The Al Maktoum family have been ruling Dubai since 1833, and under their leadership the city has become prosperous and popular with tourists from all around the world. Sheikh Mohammed became the ruler of Dubai as well as the Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE in 2006 when his father, the previous Sheikh, passed away.
In addition to his political successes, the popular leader is also a poet in the colloquial Nabati form of the Arabic language. In his youth, Sheikh Mohammed would publish his poetry under a pseudonym to ensure people liked it for its own sake and not because of his royal position. Indeed they did, and the poetry, still published but now under his own name, expresses the Sheikh’s more creative and sensitive side as a counterpoint to his powerful leadership.