Politician Sangajav BAYARTSOGT was born in 1967 in Selenge aimag in the country's north. After the democratic revolution in the country, he led the effort to reform the Mongolian Revolutionary Youth Union to found the Mongolian Youth Federation. From 1990 to 1992 he was elected to the Great People's Khural and the State Baga Khural, and at the age of 23 he became the youngest politician to adopt the new Constitution. Bayartsogt managed the exhumation and transfer of the D. Sukhbaatar and Kh. Choibalsan mausoleum, the remains of J. Sambuu and the construction of the Chinggis Complex. In 2009, on behalf of the Government of Mongolia he signed the Oyu Tolgoi Investment Agreement. He has served four terms as member of the State Ikh Khural – Parliament (1996-2000, 2004-2008, 2008-2012, and 2012 to now). He also served as Cabinet member (1998, 2004-06, 2008-2012, and 2014 to now). Following is S. Bayartsogt's reminiscence of his early fays in politics, in particular the first democratic election, the lessons learnt and the way forward.

The process and the significance of the 1990 election

Democratic movement first emerged in Mongolia in 1989 at a time when pro-democracy movements were underway in the other countries of the socialist system encouraged by perestroika and glasnost (reform and openness) policies that the former Communist Party of the Soviet Union had launched since 1985.

The key goals of the democratic revolution had been to create a multi-party system, and basing on this conduct a multi-party election and giving the people the opportunity to elect their own government. Proceeding from this premise, the Constitution was amended in May 1990 according to which the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party's (MPRP) leading and guiding roles as well as the right to legislation by the MPRP, the Mongolian Trade Unions and the Mongolian Revolutionary Youth Union (MRYU) were changed, and a bicameral parliament was created.

The first Parliamentary election was conducted in July 1990 within a very short spell of time. To illustrate,the majority election system was applied for the election of a 430 seat upper House or the Great People's Khural (GPKh) and the proportional system was used for election of a 50-seat lower House or the State Baga Khural (SBKh). Under the majority system, apart from only party nominating candidates, public organizations, work collectives etc., were given the right to nominate candidates to the Upper House, while political parties nominated candidates to the Lower House of the Parliament.

The first free and democratic election of 1990, besides its own historical significance, has gone down in the history of the country with many significant and unique events. 

There were a number of requirements for eligibility to be elected to the permanently functioning parliament or the State Baga Khural. A deputy from the GPKh would not have a seat in the Baga Khural, a two-stage election to the SBKh would be conducted and a deputy elected from the constituency should have secured more than 50% of the votes.

Not only deputies to the GPKh were elected, deputies of the aimag and soum khurals (assembly) were also elected. In other words, the 1990 elections were special in that four kinds of elections, including the 3-stage election and the party-affiliated elections were conducted.

What's more, it was not only political parties that had the right to nominate candidates. Even public organizations, individuals, and work collectives were given to right to nominate candidates of their choice. And so, another special feature of the 1990 elections was that they had the most number of candidates ever.

Yet another special feature of the elections was that if a candidate failed to win 50% of the votes or if re-election had to be conducted in a contested constituency, new candidates would run for the race in that particular constituency. The main elections were held on 22 and 29 July, and re-elections held in contested constituencies in August.

Reflecting on the candidates being nominated then, since they were nominated by organizations and work collectives, it's interesting to note today that they were mostly heads of soum party committees, soum leaders, executives of organizations, in other words, the most respected people in the given community and organization were nominated on the basis of their merits rather than their party affiliation.

In this sense, I personally think that the election of the Deputies to the GPKH in 1990 was far from being a party election.

At that time when organizations were nominating candidates, I was nominated from the MRYU Committee of Selenge aimag. I was only 23 and became the youngest GPKh deputy.Besides me, more than 30 non-partyMRYU members were elected to the GPKh and the young deputies in the GPKh formed a faction-caucus called “Young people for democracy” and I served as its chairperson for two years.

Central election commission

Then I served as the deputy chairman of the Executive Committee of the MRYU. An extraordinary congress of the Union was held in April 1990 where young people, for the first time, elected their leaders and three months later the GPKh elections were held. On behalf of the young organization I served on the Central Election Commission and it was a matter of pride as I had the opportunity to be involved in the organization of the first free and democratic elections.

The election commission members included people who were considered important in holding the elections. They included representatives of all parties, public organizations, workers and herdsmen such as the leaders of the political parties, the Trade Unions, the MRYU, Writer’s Union as well as Vice Finance Minister. The commission was not a permanently functioning body as its members all had their jobs to do and we would meet when necessary. The commission did a good job of organizing the elections and even settled disputes that arose at constituencies without even referring to the court.

The chairman of the first democratic election commission was Mongolia’s first cosmonaut Gurragchaa and his deputy was Khurmetbek. Khurmetbek would normally chair the commission meetings, he was highly demanding but also extremely good humored. He used to teach me many things. I was then a young chap, only 23 years old, and I learnt a lot from my senior colleagues with whom I had the chance to work together and also express my stand points freely. I feel happy remembering those wonderful days.

I personal think that the first free elections of 1990 were exemplary and were really good elections. The GPKh and the SBKh formed as a result of this election were the most exemplary parliaments in the history of Mongolia.

I was elected four times after that and every time I compare the elections, I feel that the attitude of the people then to their tasks and responsibilities was really good, every single person wanted to build a strong democratic and independent nation, and they were sincere in their beliefs, convictions and efforts towards this cause. Or course, in those days many things were relatively new, there were many party fragmentations and there were problems and challenges, but despite all that everyone did their best.

Therefore, today I feel that we need to thank all those who served on the central and local election commissions simply because they sacrificed everything they had to set up the democratic political structure that we have today.

The 1990 elections also granted people the right that they did not have earlier and therefore they were the fairest elections with most active participation of the electors. People were good natured, their participation in the elections was sincere, the elections costs were also small and the elections campaigns were simple unlike grandiose shows that we have today. We used to have single page leaflets as our election campaign.

The present state of elections in Mongolia and lessons learnt

Looking at the elections in Mongolia today we find that the election systems have been constantly changing. In 1990 we used the majority and proportional representation systems. In the 1992 and 2008 elections the relative majority or the First Past the Post system was applied, and the elections held in1996, 2000, and 2004 applied the classical majority system with 76 constituencies, and the 2012 elections used the parallel system.

As the election system changes the election process naturally changes too. We have been constantly streamlining the election law. In the beginning election campaigns could be conducted for 75 days or more than 2 months. And candidates who could afford the campaign stood better chance to be elected. The election campaign days were afterwards reduced to 45, and then to 28 days only. It was also prohibited to organize shows, festivals and perform religious rites during the election campaign. All this put an end to the system whereby a candidate with the most money would win in the elections.

We then regulated the issue of election promises. For example, the returns of the 2004 and 2008 elections showed that high and unfulfilling promises directly impacted the outcome of the elections.

There were high hopes that the Democratic Party, which was an opposition party, would win in the 2008 elections, and in the course of the campaign the party promised that the value of the shares for every citizen would be not less than 1 million tögrög. But in the middle of the campaign the Mongolian People’s Party (MPP) announced that the amount could be not less than 1.5 million. As a result, the MPP won the majority of seats and consequently a dispute flared up whereby the election results rejected and the first mass riot broke out, which was a tragic event in the history of Mongolia. Taking lessons from these developments, restrictions were imposed in the 2012 elections according to which the parties could not make promises more than what the state budget and the economy could handle.

Irregularities such as defamation during an election campaign and buying of votes when taken up at the courts would drag on and so, similarly like the football rules, procedures were introduced to resolve such irregularities at the constituent electoral commissions, but this matter was rejected by the Constitutional Court. And now election-related disputes are taken up and resolved by the court.

The past 25 years had such shortfalls and irregularities and everything is being done to further improve and streamline the election law, and this is an on-going process.

There is constant argument and difference of opinion on matters related to streamlining of the electoral system, how should the votes of the electors be reflected in the Parliament. Lot of criticism is leveled against the majority system simply because there were two instances in the past when more than 90% of the seats were taken even after only winning 50% of the votes. Lately we have been observing a growing trend of non-support by voters for Parliamentary members elected on party tickets because they are labeled as people who have come to office under the smokescreen of their parties.

Election campaign is a very important issue. Politicians should run for elections not only for that one particular election, but through years of constant hard work. Also the elections should be held with small budget and within a small period of time and I also deem it appropriate to recognize the such technical processes as launching and closing of election campaigns as official campaigns. This is how it is in other countries.

How to streamline the electoral system

During my five-term election to the Parliament, I have worked on and also headed working panels on introducing changes and amendments to the Constitution, the Law on Elections, and the Law on Political Parties etc.

Naturally effort was made to streamline them and in the process many foreign experience were also analyzed and studied. Mongolia is a member of IDEA – International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance based in Stockholm, Sweden. We take information, research documents from IDEA and have translated them into Mongolian. We are working closely with this intergovernmental organization.

We have before ourselves global experience. We ourselves have also experimented many systems. So what lessons can be adduce from all this? First, the electoral system must be simple, costing both less time and money. We have been able to produce election results in a short time with the introduction of the automatic voting system. If a candidate refuses to accept the results of automatic system, then the ballots can be counted manually. This amendment has been made to the Law on Elections. Although the election system and culture are improving in conjunction with progress and development, there are also gaps in terms of regulating relations that could impact on the outcome of the elections related to the election campaign with the introduction of new technology and social media.

We have before us many challenging issues pending solution. Do we monitor the election with the involvement of political parties? Do we need to hold so many elections simultaneously? Do we hold separate elections of the city authorities if we regard Ulaanbaatar, Darkhan and Erdenet as cities? Therefore, from the point of view of the electoral system, election culture and centralization etc., we have yet to determine how all these issues can be addressed.

One of our biggest shortcomings is that we go for extreme politicization within these four years of one election to another. If the parliamentary elections are held in summer, then in autumn we have the local elections and the next year we have the Presidential elections. In four years we spent almost all our time engaging in elections leaving little time for real work. This is why the Government runs short of possibilities and the time to perform.

Proceeding from this premise we are presently focusing on amendments to the Constitution. Under the proposed amendments, the President would be elected by the Parliament, Parliamentary elections would be held once every four years, and the local self-governing bodies would be elected directly by the locals without party involvement. A lot of issues can be addressed in the event these changes are made.

Together with the amendment of the Constitution, many other organic laws such as the Law on Political Parties, the Law on Civil Service etc., will be streamlined to eventually ensure a mutually complementary system is put in place.

Civil servants are the most seriously affected by the present election system. Accordingly, the state is unable to streamline its own bureaucratic system.

Second, the electoral system itself must be stable, which is extremely important. The change in the system with every election has serious implications. In industrialized countries, the election system is stable and the voters know what needs to be done during the election.

The past 25 years have been years of changes and progress but they were short of our expectations. We had the chance to accomplish more and reach greater progress. Why we failed is because we were unable to stabilize the most important institution. A study reveals that since the first elections in 1990 up to today we have had 14 Governments. Of these 4 Governments, only the Governments of Jasrai and Enkhbayar served their full 4 years in office, while the remaining 12 Governments were in office on an average of 1.3 years only. We cannot expect to see tangible results when the governments change at such close intervals.

The earnest of growth and development are the stability of the government and its policies. This in international terminology reads as political stability, political continuity. These principles are void in Mongolia. We do not have a continuity of the state affairs, that is, we lack the institutional memory. We start from scratch everything by negating all the previous studies, estimations and systems, and this is not only giving rise to doubts domestically but also even among foreign investors. Therefore, there is a pressing need to streamline the system and the decision-making mechanisms, in other words, we need to alter the rules of the political games, make them much more precise and easy to understand and appreciate.

These past 25 years have been years when Mongolia carried out a democratic revolution, and successfully carried out reform by simultaneously effecting economic and political reforms (some even consider this as impossible).

Private businesses and private entrepreneurs have made invaluable contribution to the present growth and development of the country, carrying the heaviest of all burdens, for which the government and people of Mongolia must pay due respect. But the politicians must take responsibility for the mistakes and errors.

I personally feel that basing on the 25 years of lessons learnt, we must leave for the future generations such a political and legal environment that would have made tangible changes in the Constitution, and simplified the rules of the games of decision-making, and today’s politicians must recognize this as their responsibility they bear before the future.

Source: The Mongolian Observer