Wordcount overload: Former UAE minister ridiculed for publishing 20,500 page autobiography

The father of the current Emirati ambassador to Washington has revealed the publication of his autobiography... all 20,500 pages of it.

MENA

2 min read

The New Arab

18 May, 2020

The former minister announced the news on social media [Twitter]

A former Emirati minister has announced the publication of his long-awaited autobiography, but left his followers shocked by the number of pages that make up the tome.

Manea Al-Otaiba, a former minister and the father of the UAE's current ambassador to Washington, said his autobiography will be split into 41 volumes and will contain a total of 20,500 pages.

Each volume will hold a whopping 500 pages of work, he added, noting the publication took four years to compile and came to fruition after an entire team worked on the project.

However, the announcement from the former minister of petroleum and industry prompted ridicule online, with many slamming the 74-year-old for exaggerating the project for attention and provocation as a mere marketing strategy.

"Even biographies of the mightiest leader on earth, that captured control of the planet from its east to its west, do not have biographies that are that long," one Twitter user said.

Read also: Leaked emails reveal UAE ambassador to Washington's hyper-sexual 'double life'

"The Beginning and the End is a 21 part book and it contains the start of creation, the stories of the prophets, the detailed biography of the prophet and all Islamic History, all the way to the signs of the [Final] Hour. This guy has written his life in 41 volumes," another user said.

Otaiba worked for years as a special advisor to Sheikh Zayed Al-Nahyan - the founder of the UAE - and is considered to be one of the most prominent poets in the Gulf state.

His son, Youssef, is the current Emirati ambassador to the US and whose recent leaked emails in 2017 revealed Abu Dhabi's attempts to covertly shape Washington's foreign policy.

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