Mongolians head to the polls amid economic woes

Mongolians were voting in parliamentary elections across the vast, lightly populated country, a US ally squeezed between authoritarian governments in China and Russia.

The polls are being held amid considerable success in the country’s fight against the coronavirus, with just 215 cases of Covid-19 recorded.

All of them have been imported and no one has died.

Economic malaise, corruption and weak public services dominate concerns among the country’s 3.2 million people, about half of whom live in the capital, Ulaanbaatar.

Electricity and sewage treatment are in particularly short supply in the slum communities that surround the capital, mostly populated by former herders who have given up life on the steppe.

Polling places opened at 7am and close at 10pm with finals results not expected until today. Some also voted at mobile polling stations on Tuesday.

Mongolia has maintained a 30year democracy instituted after a new constitution was adopted in 1992 following six decades of communism. The Mongolian People’s Party is seeking to retain the 65 seats it won in the 76-seat State Great Khural in 2016 while its chief rival, the Democratic Party, will seek to claw back some of its losses.

More than 600 candidates are running in 29 constituencies under a system that returns two to three members from each district.

Urban areas in the largely rural country are the most hotly contested, with 28 candidates running in one district of Ulaanbaatar.

Landlocked Mongolia boasts vast mineral wealth but has struggled to attract foreign investment because of plunging commodity prices and high-profile disputes between the government and large investors such as mining giant Rio Tinto.

Despite its success in holding down infections, Mongolia’s economy is set to shrink because of the pandemic and prices are rising.

Corruption and a bulging national debt of about US$23bil (RM98bil), or twice the country’s annual economic output, have also been a major drag on the economy.