Andy Burnham had barely settled into his No 10 office when he picked up the phone to Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, president of the United Arab Emirates.
The official account of the conversation says the new Prime Minister ‘began by thanking His Highness for his country’s investment into Manchester and the incredible impact it has had on the city’.
But those familiar with the enthusiastic former Manchester mayor might imagine his thanks were rather warmer than the understated Downing Street summary suggests.
The UAE leader’s brother, Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, owns Manchester City. His investment has reshaped both the football club and Manchester’s city centre, with his millions helping drive the ‘Manchester miracle’ growth story that helped carry Mr Burnham to the top of British politics.
Perhaps, then, it is no surprise that Mr Burnham contacted Sheikh Mohamed. Nor is it surprising that, as Our News Outlet has learned, the UAE’s ambassador to the UK, Mansoor Abulhoul, visited the Prime Minister a fortnight ago with Khaldoon Al Mubarak, Manchester City’s chairman and the central figure in what is rapidly becoming football’s biggest scandal.
Before entering No 10 for what was apparently a meeting with Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds, Mr Mubarak was seen walking casually along Downing Street. The meeting, held only days before Manchester City’s guilty verdicts were released, reportedly covered existing and future UAE investment in Britain.
It was not the first time the Prime Minister had met Abu Dhabi’s most influential non-royal figure. The pair were photographed together at Manchester City’s Etihad Stadium in 2019.
Khaldoon Al Mubarak with Andy Burnham at Manchester City’s Etihad Stadium
Against that backdrop, many football supporters were furious and stunned by the scale of Manchester City’s alleged cheating. Yet Mr Burnham appeared sympathetic to the club’s owners, saying he would be ‘really concerned’ if they chose to sell and that it was ‘frustrating when people rush to judgment’.
This was not simply a response to an untested accusation. After a prolonged investigation, three judges on an independent commission found Manchester City’s owners guilty of repeatedly breaching Premier League rules over almost a decade. The club is appealing the verdict.
An incredulous public questioned what Mr Burnham was thinking. Robert Jenrick, Reform’s Treasury spokesman, said: ‘He seems more interested in Middle Eastern money than protecting the integrity of the game.’
Downing Street subsequently sought to soften the remarks, stating that ‘wherever wrongdoing is established, those responsible should face the appropriate consequences’.
Even so, concerns are growing that Mr Burnham’s close relationship with Emirati figures could leave him vulnerable to pressure. Nick McGeehan, director of FairSquare, a sports and human rights research organisation, told Our News Outlet that there was genuine concern the UAE might exploit its ‘obviously developed’ relationship with Mr Burnham in an effort to avoid punishment.
‘I suspect they will go very hard on the UK Government, using a huge amount of political pressure in the hope that it will lean on the Premier League,’ he said.
Online football forums have been full of criticism. One recurring argument is that a courageous politician should have challenged questionable foreign investors. Yet Mr Burnham once appeared to be that politician. As sports minister in 2008, the lifelong Everton supporter warned that billionaire takeovers could endanger the future of the national game. He also argued for tougher checks on prospective club owners to ensure their plans served the interests of both the team and its community.
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The Etihad Stadium… City’s owners have invested hundreds of millions on the site and surrounding areas in east Manchester
Almost 20 years later, he seems to have shifted towards supporting the interests of wealthy investors. Last week’s comments were not the first occasion on which Mr Burnham defended Manchester City’s owners. During a 2023 podcast interview, he was asked about Manchester council ‘selling swathes of land to the club’s owners’ and whether that troubled him.
‘Go to east Manchester now and look at photographs of it 30 years ago,’ Mr Burnham said on Pod Save The UK. ‘A large amount of the investment has come in from the owners of Manchester City.’
There is no doubt that the club’s owners have poured substantial sums into Manchester. Their projects include the £450million Co-Op Live venue, a £200million football facility and a £300million redevelopment of the Etihad Stadium’s north stand.
Abu Dhabi United Group, the private equity group owned by Sheikh Mansour, bought Manchester City itself for £200million in 2008.
The sale was timely for Manchester city council, which owns the Etihad, and which had its own money problems. Six years later the council collaborated with ADUG in a £1billion investment deal to build Manchester Life – a 6,000-home project in east Manchester. The terms of this arrangement were later found by academics at the University of Sheffield to be startlingly favourable for ADUG.
The leaseholds for land, property assets, rental and sales income rights, and ultimate control of the joint ventures, were all held by entities owned by ADUG, often via companies based in Jersey, which allowed the firms to benefit from negligible tax.
A council spokesman said: ‘Claims that some land was sold too cheaply to Manchester Life ignore the fact that there was zero market interest at the time of the sale, that the land is worth more now precisely because of Manchester Life’s investment.’
Nevertheless, others believe that the UAE’s investment in Manchester was part of a pattern.
‘The Premier League provides an incredible international advertising platform for Abu Dhabi’s state-owned entities,’ said Christopher Davidson, an expert on the UAE at Durham University. ‘And by investing in football, museums and hospitals, or even east Manchester, Abu Dhabi is winning hearts and minds.’
Others take an even more jaundiced view. Amnesty, the human rights group, once said the UAE’s ‘enormous investment’ in the club was ‘one of football’s most brazen attempts to “sportswash” a country’s deeply tarnished image’, adding that City’s success involved a ‘close relationship with a country that relies on exploited migrant labour and locks up peaceful critics’.
Not that Mr Burnham would be one, telling that 2023 podcast ‘those issues are for the Government to raise to a different level’.
Yet it should not be forgotten that there was a downside to Manchester’s property-led boom. Rents have gone up at a dizzying rate, amid a serious dearth of affordable housing. As mayor, this was once foremost among Mr Burnham’s concerns. He has greater worries now.
Even so, as the Man City scandal shows, his mayoralty is beginning to cast a shadow over his time in office – and it is one that shows no sign of fading any time soon.
