Yea smali is right; they tightened the laws when they found Oil and the whole world started moving in to do business. Before that it was only other Arabs who would probably get UAE citizenship.
As it is now, you cannot own a business in UAE without a local partner. So pretty much all the expats in the UAE who run business have to pay a local (usually monthly/per signature) to get them to sign off on their papers as a partner, so that they can legally run a business.
All multinationals and big corporations need a fixed % of locals on their payroll. So again they pay locals to sign off as being an employee, even if they don't show up to work a day in their lives.
All the government companies - utilities, telecom, construction, real estate, and a few others - have locals as CEOs and upper management by law.
It's a credit to the fine leadership of the Sheikhs of UAE that they have managed to develop the country so well in such a short amount of time, and that despite all these perks the number of spoiled, rich, under accomplishing Arabs is actually quite low. Sure having tons of Oil Money helps, but they still have to use it wisely, and plan well, and they generally have done a great job at that.
Also the labour laws were bad. The thing is, as a labourer, your visa needs to be tied to a company. Many of the subcontinental people who came over to work as labourers were lied to by the people who brought them over. They paid for a visa and gave in their passports expecting office jobs or working as domestic helpers - they were then forced to work as labourers with their passports in the hands of the company that brought them over. Sure the laws were poor and lax from UAE, but the government wasn't the one bringing these workers in on false promises and fake visas. They took a long time to crack down on it - the cheap labour was essential to their growth and economy, so that's pretty poor from them. And when people were caught working on fake/expried visa, they were imprisoned/deported.
But they eventually fixed the laws, and anyone found to be bringing people over on fake visas were threatened with harsher punishments than those who were caught on fake visas themselves.
Atleast, this is all i recall from my time there. I have done literally 0 research, just recapping all the conversations the grown ups would have and what I read in the magazines and newspapers.
Even without being a citizen, life in UAE is quite nice. It is a lot more liberal than most of the Middle East. You have a greater amount of freedom when it comes to press, you have Churches and Temples, you can purchase and consume alcohol and pork, and women have pretty much the same rights as men. It's why the expats all flock to there. You also have a thriving subcontinental culture - food, festivals, bollywood movies in all the cinemas, several Indian and Pakistani radio stations, and even stuff like cricket. It's called 'Filter India' or 'Filter Pakistan' by the people who live there. Even TV networks like Zee and Star have custom channels to suit the UAE timings and audience.
It's more restricted than living in a proper liberal society, but it's pretty nice. And by all accounts I've heard its wayyy better than living in Pakistan apparently.
