Page 5 - AsiaElec Week 49 2022

AsiaElec COMMENTARY AsiaElec

to Selbe River improvement projects. Thus, the Independent Authority Against Corruption
the talk of government officials pocketing more (IAAC) and the Mongolian Central Intelligence
than $12.8bn over a decade was always going to Agency had travelled to South Gobi, where the
spur plenty of people to defy the cold and ignite Erdene Tavan Tolgoi mine is situated. According
a big demonstration. to a source, approximately 50 people involved in
On November 22, Minister of Economic the coal mafia investigation were already on-site
Development Khurelbaatar Chimed briefed at the company headquarters and mine.
the press on the coal affair, in which officials
are said to have stolen coal consignments ear- Government working group
marked for export and sold them as their own. His moves cam after an attempt by Prime Min-
Khurelbaatar described the case as one in which ister Oyun-Erdene Luvsannamsrai on Decem-
364,000 tonnes of coal were illegally exported ber 7 to address an angry crowd was drowned
over a four-year period. Those involved in the out by cries of “Accountability!” and “Reveal the
coal robbery would face justice, he insisted, but names!”.
he did not name any of those accused or under Growing ire at how officials are said to have
suspicion. embezzled billions of dollars of profits from coal
The government has repsonded to the exports to China has energised the public to take
protests, with the sacking of coal executives, to the streets of the capital Ulaanbaatar despite
although protests are now demanding that min- the biting Mongolian winter cold. Calls for swift
teriasl head also roll. action against the “public purse thieves” have
On December 7, the demonstrations contin- grown louder.
ued for a fifth straight day, with citizens again In response, the government has proposed
braving sub-zero temperatures as they called for forming a working group that would include
accountability for the alleged theft of $12.8bn in around 100 people who would represent the
coal export revenues. protesters. But the idea of the panel is not going
Nyambaatar Khishgee, minister of justice down well with many of those protesting.
and internal affairs, addressed a crowd gath- They’re convinced it won’t be effective. “I don’t
ered in Ulaanbaatar. He informed the protesters believe that anyone who would join this working
that Gankhuyag Battulga, the former CEO of group would actually represent the protesters,”
state-owned coal mining and export company, said a 30-year-old welder, who went by the alias
Erdenes Tavan Tolgoi, members of his family Bold, as he spoke to bne IntelliNews. “They had
and four other businessmen were arrested on a working group in April [after a big youth pro-
December 6 following house searches. test centred on economic hardship], and nothing
According to local media outlet Eguur, happened. [The prime minister] is once more
Nyambaatar specified the seven other individ- using this tactic simply to squelch the protests.”
uals as under arrest as: wife N. Odgerel, sister B. “Those working groups are just an act. No
Narantuya, son-in-law D. Purevdorj, Erdenes one in those working groups will represent the
Tavan Tolgoi communications advisor S. Enkh- actual people who are suffering,” said Uuganjar-
tur, director of Success Radar LLC S. Enkhtu- gal Oyun, 33, one of the December 7 protesters.
vshin as well as the company’s executive director “I can’t afford to buy a half kilo of flour right now;
M. Khurelbaatar, and B. Khishigdorj, owner of it’s depressing. We live in a society where there
Khishig Arvin Industrial LLC. are way too many fines and taxes. If given the
The minister also revealed that a team from opportunity, I would leave Mongolia to make

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