KEY POINTS:
You could hardly blame the Dubai sheikhs for reaching a conclusion their money's okay when it comes to backing New Zealand into the America's Cup, but not much else.
It's extraordinary how the merger deal between Dubai Inc and Auckland International Airport - that just two months ago was hailed as a great opportunity to cement linkages with the burgeoning Middle East power house - has turned into such a sour custard.
Dubai Inc, apparently insulted by NZ Government ministers' xenophobic reaction to a planned merger with Auckland International Airport, issued quiet orders to Dubai Aerospace Enterprises to challenge the way the airport board has handled the complex bid.
Inquiries disclose that DAE's merger team led by DAE Airport's CEO Kjeld Binger was not the major driving force behind the decision to issue a notice to the airport company on Thursday claiming the recent decision by Air New Zealand to seek a judicial review of its aeronautical pricing process constituted a prescribed occurrence under their merger implementation agreement.
Neither side is saying anything publicly while a five-day consultation process is under way.
But inquiries offshore suggest the instruction to go hard on the issue came much further up DAE's food chain - from a board which sports many of Dubai's major political and business players.
One of DAE's founding committee members is Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem who was reportedly assured by Trade Minister Phil Goff that the NZ Government did not share the US Government's protectionist concerns over investment in key infrastructures by Dubai.
Goff played host to Bin Sulayem during a whirlwind visit facilitated by Investment New Zealand the weekend before the DAE/Auckland Airport proposal was announced.
That deal was not directly canvassed during the talks. But Bin Sulayem was apparently reassured by Goff's approach.
That Goff would turn around just weeks later and say the Government agreed with local opposition to the deal would understandably have shocked Dubai Inc. More salt would have been rubbed in that wound by Goff's published comment to the centre-left City Vision ticket for next month's Auckland local body elections that the question of public ownership of key assets had been handed to us on a plate.
If Goff had told Bin Sulayem that Labour favoured community ownership of airports and other infrastructure assets the deal would unlikely to have proceeded in its current form.
There's another issue. The DAE board is chaired by Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed al Maktoum who also chairs the Emirates airline group.
It was Emirates after all, with its ready sponsorship, that enabled Team NZ to compete in the recent America's Cup. The DAE chairman must have felt welcome in New Zealand after all the hoopla over Emirates Team NZ's Louis Vuitton Cup win.
But the Dubai-based company has learnt the hard way that the pre-deal assurances by Auckland Airport's board that Dubai would be welcomed at the highest levels in New Zealand have turned out to be a mirage.
Certainly Auckland Airport's board - which assured DAE that the merger would likely be welcomed at the highest levels - will be extremely disappointed at the outcome.
It would be unfair to blame directors John Maasland (chairman), Mike Smith, Tony Frankham, Joan Withers and Keith Turner for this.
If DAE comes back, it is unlikely to be through a merger which keeps the current directors of Auckland Airport in the box seat, but through an open market bid for shares in the airport company.
If both sides can't resolve the DAE issue by next Thursday either party can walk away from the deal.
But the way DAE has fashioned its objections by also claiming the airport board has not done enough to push the deal suggests it will seek compensation of up to $4 million from Auckland International Airport as compensation for the cash it has spent on the project.
