In your debt

In your debt

Has debt become a thing of the past for UAE residents? Or is it just owning up to it that’s proving difficult?

February 8, 2011 4:47 by Eva Fernandes

Kipp will be honest, sometimes we are, like most journalists, guilty of putting words in people’s mouths. We don’t intend to, but when you have to ask questions for a living, you will find you often know what answers you will get. But every now and then you get a response that shocks you a bit and throws you off the entire argument you were going to make on the basis of that predictable answer you were hoping for.

Take, for instance, the question we asked on our poll last week. We asked: A recent study found 90 percent of UAE residents have outstanding bank loans. Kipp wants to know, where is your debt? The options were: a) I have none. I am one of the 10 percent!; b)Back in my home country (that’s why I’m here); c) Here (that’s why I’m not back in my home country); and d) Here (but I’m seriously tempted to leave it at the airport with the keys in).

Now, you don’t need to be an evil word-twisting genius like Kipp to share our expectation: obviously the majority of the residents would agree with the last two statements. After all, this is Dubai: the haven of debt. This is where debt goes to hang out with other debt. This is a city which is neck deep in billions and billions of debt. And if you needed any further persuasion on the matter, you just need to refer to the survey we mentioned in our question: 90 percent of UAE residents have outstanding loans.

Of course, our sneaky plan was to ask a question like this that will simply confirm our suspicions and then chastise our readers. “Irresponsible accumulation of debt,” we would preach, “is not something to take lightly.” But as luck would have it, on the very same day there is absolutely NO news worthy of writing about, we get results of the poll which are the exact opposite of what we expected.

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