He is the current chairman of Abu Dhabi Fund for Development (ADFD).
He succeeded to both posts on 3 November 2004, replacing his father Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, who had died the day before. He had effectively been acting president earlier, since his father was ill during the period prior to his passing.
On 1 December 2005, the President announced that half of the members of the Federal National Council, the closest body the country has to a parliament, will be indirectly elected. However, half of the council's members will still need to be appointed by the leaders of the emirates. The 40-member FNC serves in an advisory capacity. The elections were set to take place in December 2006.
On 4 January 2010, the world's tallest man-made structure, originally known as Burj Dubai, was renamed to Burj Khalifa, in honor of the Sheikh .
Sheikh Khalifa is known for his interest in sports traditional to UAE, chiefly horse and camel racing. He is generally regarded as a pro-Western modernizer. Early in his term, in April 2005, he authorized a 100% salary increase for employees of the state.
In 2010 Khalifa was described in a recent WikiLeaks cable signed by the U.S. ambassador as a "distant and uncharismatic personage.
In recent times there have been question marks over his health as he has not been seen in public for a number of months since returning from receiving medical treatment in Europe for an undisclosed condition. In 2011 he sent in the UAE's Air Force and Navy to support the Anti - Gaddafi rebels against Muammar Gaddafi alongside NATO, Qatar, Sweden and Jordan.
Khalifa is building a six-storey palace on the main island of the Seychelles, on the site of a former United States satellite tracking station, the 27 hectares of land were bought by Khalifa for millions Seychelles rupee. Sewage from the huts and shipping containers which house the hundreds of South Asian workers building the palace has polluted one of Seychelles' main rivers, and has destroyed the water supply of several villages.
According to Forbes, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan is the world's third wealthiest monarch, with an estimated wealth of US$19 billion.
On 30 April 2007, Johns Hopkins Medicine announced a "magnificent" and "transformational" gift by Sheikh Khalifa,[7] most of which, made in honor of Sheikh Khalifa’s father, Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, was planned to support construction of the Johns Hopkins Hospital’s new cardiovascular and critical care tower (also to be named after Sheikh Zayed). Additionally, some funds would be directed to cardiovascular as well as AIDS research.
He also founded the Khalifa Award for Education and finances a major housing programme in Sheikh Khalifa City (Gaza Strip).
A building in the theology department at the University of Wales is named after him, due to his being a benefactor.
MD Anderson Cancer Center announced on January 19, 2011 that they received $150 Million From Abu Dhabi Charity;.
The Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan Charity Foundation has pledged $150 million to the University of Texas, M. D. Anderson Cancer Center to establish a cancer treatment clinic, the Emirates News Agency reports.
The largest grant in the center's history will support construction of a state-of-the-art facility to house the Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan Specialty Institute for Cancer Diagnosis and the Ahmed bin Zayed Al Nahyan Pancreatic Cancer Center. The grant also will fund a number of annual fellowships and will be used to endow an oncology chair named after Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, a cancer research chair named after Sheikh Khalifa University, and a scientific and medical research chair named after Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan.
Speaking at a signing ceremony, M. D. Anderson Center president John Mendelsohn said that the funding will be channeled into research programs dedicated to discovering new and more effective ways of diagnosing and treating cancer.
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