The proposal to restructure the Cabinet in order to promote “work that is faster, more dynamic, more accurate, and has a higher level of responsibility” that was publicly announced by the Prime Minister on September 9 will be brought up for discussion during the Fall Session of Parliament.
On one hand, there are certain Parliament members who are interested in changing the current structure as soon as the Prime Minister brought up the proposal. There also seem to be many members of the opposition that secretly dream of a MPP-DP joint government and another chance at becoming a minister. President Ts. Elbegdorj gave directions to assign ministerial positions on a merit-based system, with less regard to political party affiliations. The authority of our Prime Minister has fallen below that of some of his Ministers. The opposition is calling for the resignation of N. Batbayar, the Minister of Economic Development. Many members of Parliament were against increasing the size of the Cabinet from the beginning.
On the other hand, there are also many members of Parliament that are against calling for the resignation of the entire Cabinet halfway throughtheir terms. Some members see this as a way for N. Altankhuyag to duck responsibility and try to putall the blame onto the Cabinet structure and its members. There is yet another group of members that feel restructuring the 16 ministries into 11 will not have a significant impact and there is no need to expend the costs to change the ministry names, seals, and addresses as well as cause trouble for a considerable number of people. Some members say that this Cabinet restructuring proposal is a cunning plan to draw the public’s attention away from the economic hardships and is a way for the Prime Minister to win time by debating at length in Parliament.
Even with the multiple reasons mentioned above, it is not too difficult to infer the real reason behind the Prime Minister working to restructure and replace the Cabinet that he himself established two years ago. This would be the restructuring of an entire Cabinet in order to replace Minister N. Batbayar, who has amassed more authority than him. A mediocre method employed by poor management.
Generally, governance should be established so that the Cabinet structure is established through legislature, not by the Government itself, and the Prime Minister appoints the members. In 2000, seven amendments were made to the constitution, of which Article 29 stating, “Members of Parliament cannot serve in any other positions… except as Prime Minister and Cabinet Member” is the root of the governance crisis. The MPP (then MPRP) seems to have forgotten that they themselves approved all this while they call for the removal of “dual roles”.
We have gone through 15 years of national instability due to political instability. The Mongolian Government is unable to find its feet because of the peculiar model of restructuring of the Cabinet on an annual basis that has been established. The two previous Cabinets for “Alliance” and “Reform” especially relied on the delicate balance between the political interests of the political parties. Attempting to balance political interests by establishing, in name only, positions such as Deputy Minister, which has by “Parkinson’s Law” led to a weak Minister with two weak Deputies and an increase in the size of the Government.
N. Altankhuyag established agreements with smaller parties to establish a joint Cabinet and established the status quo between the parties through the bartering of Minister and Deputy Minister Positions. The status quo between the factions of the Democratic Party, which are divided not by ideology but by funds raised for the party and elections, was established internally. It would be very easy to upset these two delicate balances, and if said balances are lost it would become nearly impossible to establish a new Cabinet or appoint a new Prime Minister, and would likely lead to a time consuming governance crisis.
The current economic situation would only worsen during restructuring and reappointment and the delays in decision making that would undoubtedly follow. Will there be a political power willing to accept all responsibility for and lead a government with lost public budget revenues, depleted foreign currency reserves, and a fallen tugrug exchange rate? We will have to repay 500 million dollars of government bonds in three years and there doesn’t seem to be a single party that is considering from where and how these payments will be made.
In actuality, there needs to be few conditions met before the Mongolian Government can function well and become stable. First of all, with the exception of the Prime Minster, we cannot have members of Parliament fulfilling other roles. The reason for this is that we Mongolians have plainly seen that with only 76 members of Parliament, having 20 percent as members of the Cabinet leads to a breakdown in accountability. The next condition is the need to see the agendas of political parties and choose accordingly. Also, public funding for parties with seats in Parliament will end up being cheaper for Mongolians and will also provide an opportunity to control corruption. In order to conduct fair elections and obtain accurate income and expenditure statements from political parties the Election Commission needs to be dissolved and the Voters Commission needs to be established in its place. Finally, the roles of Ministries need to be clearly established. Otherwise some Ministries have become similar to businesses. By controlling the prices of common consumer products, the government has given false information to the market and insured the monopoly rights of certain companies and as such is likely to disrupt supply.
While these conditions are not met there is little chance for the Mongolian government to function stably and effectively. Until then, it is necessary for us to stop restructuring the Cabinet and instead focus on strengthening the Government.
The reappointment of one or two Ministers is within the authority of Prime Minister N. Altankhuyag, and does not require approval from Parliament. There is no need to restructure the entire Cabinet. Why try to pull the wool over our eyes?