This month’s election in Oman may give the small Gulf sultanate a glossier democratic veneer, but it is unlikely to bury the discontent exposed by protests in February inspired by Arab uprisings elsewhere. These have helped to calm the streets, although protests demanding the release of prisoners simmered into September, and Oman’s three million people remain mostly loyal to the sultan, Reuters reports. Yet many Omanis are underwhelmed by the trickle of reforms since the spasm of protest driven by demands for jobs, higher salaries and an end to graft in Oman, the only Gulf Arab state besides Bahrain to see widescale popular unrest.