On the evening of Friday 29^th January the Mongolian Great State Khural (Parliament) met will full attendance to debate an important subject, namely the proposed dismissal of the Prime Minister and the Government. The debate lasted six hours – well into the night.

The session began with a speech by A.Bakei, head of the State Structure Standing Committee in which he presented the outcome of their meeting, namely to keep the PM and the Government. The vote seems to have been tight: ten of the nineteen members of the committee voted against the proposal to dismiss Prime Minister (passed by 52.9%). Next the head of the Mongolian People’s Party (MMP) Group in Parliament, S.Byambatsogt, presented their unanimous decision to dismiss the PM. The debate was unique insofar as it was chaired by two speakers; first by Deputy Speaker S.Gonchigdorj and then from around 21.00 pm by Speaker Z.Enkhbold himself. This has not happened many times in the history of the Mongolian Parliament.

Relating to the issue of the debate, a total of 57 MP’s pressed the button to ask a question; most, however, were simply making statements and giving their opinions than asking questions.

As the debate went on President Elbegdorj himself entered the Parliament Hall and said: “I want to say how I think such a situation should be solved in the future. Let’s stop dismissing one Prime Minister and then leaving Parliament to search for a new one. It’s easy for 19 MP’s or more to collect signatures and request that the Prime Minister be dismissed – but in future they need to propose who the replacement will be”.

After a very long discussion, lasting until 01:00 am at night, Parliament finally voted to keep the Government by a 57.5% majority. This means that the present Government, which was set up five months ago, will remain unchanged until the next General Election.