The role of the president has envoled over time because

Presidential power has steadily increased

the arab empire adopted the muslim religion as their main belief. arabs would influence the people from the territories they invaded towards islam (the muslim belief).

nevertheless, throughout the history of the arab empire, rulers brought intellectual individuals from other religions to their centers of learning. these other foreigners included jews, christians, greeks, persians, and indians.   these resulted in the adoption of important knowledge developed by these cultures by the arabic empire. for example, the works of aristotle were translated from greek to arab and indian scientists brought the numerical concept of "zero" to the arabs.

nowadays, 93% of the arab population is muslim, which at the same time is subdivided in sects including the sunni, zaini, alawi, shia. the remaining 7% is composed mainly of christians.

an informal structure in a bureaucracy would be something like so-called "office politics". where there's a formal structure set up for the organization, but then an informal subculture as well that has a way of organizing the bureaucracy further. this can be positive because it sets up an added degree of organization, albeit informal, within the bureaucracy.