Head of the Office of the Government S.Bayartsogt attended the Minister Hour today to introduce on the activities of the cabinet and addressed questions from the journalists.
It has already been five weeks since the cabinet submitted the Tavantolgoi Deposit Development Agreement draft to the State Great Khural and is on hold until the Working Group led by MP L.Erdenechimeg established with the order of the Speaker of the Parliament delivers the its report, which is being delayed according to MP L.Erdenechimeg due to the lack of all the requested documents.
For instance, MP L.Erdenechimeg mentioned the delays to receive English version of the agreement with the investors, to which S.Bayartsogt answered that the requested documents have been delivered 10 days ago.
Moreover, although some of the requested documents were undisclosable the cabinet had delivered for the internal use only. On June 9th WG requested the agreement referal of between the companies, which was denied as the matter was relevant to internal procedures of the companies. Other than that all the Tavantolgoi related documents are available for the WG according to S.Bayartsogt and he critizised that Mongolia has no secrets, which is not seen anywhere in the world.
Second issue was related to Constitutional Amendments working group, where S.Bayartsogt is the member as well and main changes proposed with the amendments.
According to Head of the Office of the Government, although proposed amendments may sseem big in numbers they are covering only three main directions and emphasized that according to the international experts Mongolia has Parliamentary governance with strong President.
Parliamentary involvement in the executive power is much higher in Mongolia and issues related with Oyu Tolgoi and Tavantolgoi should have been resolved in a business manner and handled by the Cabinet only. Therefore, Mongolia is seen as country with unique parliamentary governance. Amendments to the Constitution is directed at resolving those issues.
-There were proposals to increase number of member of the parliament?
-In 1992 with the declaration of the Constitution we have approved the Parliament to have 76 members. Since that time population of Mongolia has increased by a million. Number of the voters have big gap in the city and rural areas by 3-4 times. In order to balance the representation of the population it was proposed to increase the number of members by 33% or to have 99-100 MPs. But the matter is to be discussed.
WG is also touching on the issues related with administrative units. According to the Constitution Mongolia has only one city. Proposals received are discussing adding Erdenet and Darkhan as cities.
-It was proposed to limit the rights of the President?
-Since the approval of the new constitution 23 years ago Mongolia had 4 presidents and it has been seen as if all of them were working under different legal environment. In order to have parliamentary governance president should be appointed by the parlliament.
Head of the Office of the Government S.Bayartsogt attended the Minister Hour today to introduce on the activities of the cabinet and addressed questions from the journalists.
It has already been five weeks since the cabinet submitted the Tavantolgoi Deposit Development Agreement draft to the State Great Khural and is on hold until the Working Group led by MP L.Erdenechimeg established with the order of the Speaker of the Parliament delivers the its report, which is being delayed according to MP L.Erdenechimeg due to the lack of all the requested documents.
For instance, MP L.Erdenechimeg mentioned the delays to receive English version of the agreement with the investors, to which S.Bayartsogt answered that the requested documents have been delivered 10 days ago.
Moreover, although some of the requested documents were undisclosable the cabinet had delivered for the internal use only. On June 9th WG requested the agreement referal of between the companies, which was denied as the matter was relevant to internal procedures of the companies. Other than that all the Tavantolgoi related documents are available for the WG according to S.Bayartsogt and he critizised that Mongolia has no secrets, which is not seen anywhere in the world.
Second issue was related to Constitutional Amendments working group, where S.Bayartsogt is the member as well and main changes proposed with the amendments.
According to Head of the Office of the Government, although proposed amendments may sseem big in numbers they are covering only three main directions and emphasized that according to the international experts Mongolia has Parliamentary governance with strong President.
Parliamentary involvement in the executive power is much higher in Mongolia and issues related with Oyu Tolgoi and Tavantolgoi should have been resolved in a business manner and handled by the Cabinet only. Therefore, Mongolia is seen as country with unique parliamentary governance. Amendments to the Constitution is directed at resolving those issues.
-There were proposals to increase number of member of the parliament?
-In 1992 with the declaration of the Constitution we have approved the Parliament to have 76 members. Since that time population of Mongolia has increased by a million. Number of the voters have big gap in the city and rural areas by 3-4 times. In order to balance the representation of the population it was proposed to increase the number of members by 33% or to have 99-100 MPs. But the matter is to be discussed.
WG is also touching on the issues related with administrative units. According to the Constitution Mongolia has only one city. Proposals received are discussing adding Erdenet and Darkhan as cities.
-It was proposed to limit the rights of the President?
-Since the approval of the new constitution 23 years ago Mongolia had 4 presidents and it has been seen as if all of them were working under different legal environment. In order to have parliamentary governance president should be appointed by the parlliament.