Mongolian Art

Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj

(This is a Mongolian name; the name "Tsakhia" is a patronymic, not a family name, and the person should be referred to by his or her given name, "Elbegdorj".)
Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj or Elbegdorj Tsakhia (Mongolian: Цахиагийн Элбэгдорж) (born March 30, 1963) is a Mongolian politician and the President of Mongolia, having won the election on May 24, 2009. The candidate of the Democratic Party, he became Mongolia's first president to never have been a member of the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party[citation needed] and the first to obtain a Western education. Elbegdorj was one of the leaders of the peaceful democratic revolution in 1990 that ended nearly 75 years of communist rule.
Elbegdorj has been the Prime Minister of Mongolia twice, the vice speaker of the parliament once, the majority leader of the parliament once, and a member of parliament four times. He is known as a pro-democracy, libertarian politician.
Elbegdorj is also the founder of Mongolia's first independent newspaper. 

Childhood and education
Elbegdorj was born into a herding family in Zereg sum, Khovd on March 30, 1963. His father, M. Tsakhia, was a veteran of Mongolia's border conflict with Manchuguo that resulted in the 1939 Battle of Khalkhyn Gol. Elbegdorj finished the sum's eight-year school in 1979. Afterwards, his family moved to Erdenet, and he graduated from Erdenet's No.1 ten-year school in 1981.
In 1981/82, he worked in the Erdenet copper combine as a machinist, and in 1982 was drafted into military service. For heading a Revolutionary Youth League group in the army, he was awarded with the possibility to study Journalism and Marxism-Leninism at he Military Political Institute of the USSR in Lviv (Ukraine) from 1983 on. He graduated in 1988 and then worked for the army newspaper Ulaan Od (Red Star).
After his first term as prime minister, he spent a year at the University of Colorado at Boulder's Economic Institute, earning a Diploma in 2001. Then Elbegdorj studied with a full scholarship of Harvard University and graduated from Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government with a Master of Public Administration (MPA) in 2002. 

Marriage and family
Elbegdorj and Bolormaa Khajidsuren got acquainted to each other at an ice breaker students’ party in Lviv, Ukraine. They were married when they were students and their first baby was born in Lviv, Ukraine. They have five children those are four sons and an adopted daughter. In addition, Elbegdorj and Bolormaa have helped over 300 orphans through Bolormaa’s Bolor Foundation. Bolor Foundation opened savings account for most of the children. Elbegdorj and Bolormaa are foster parents of around 20 children of “Baby Bear” class of Foster care state center in Ulaanbaatar. Elbegdorj and his wife Bolormaa visit their foster children as often as they can, take care of the children for their all needs including medical, piano class and dance class for several years. 

Democratic movement
During his studies in the USSR, Elbegdorj learned about Glasnost and concepts such as freedom of speech and economic liberties. After returning to Mongolia, he met with other like-minded people and tried to present those ideas to a wider audience, despite attempts of repression from the Politburo and threats by his employer to lose his job. When giving a speech at Young Artists’ Second National Congress on November 28, 1989, in the end of his speech, Elbegdorj said that Mongolia needed democracy and appealed youth to collaborate and organize an organization together for establishing democracy in Mongolia. He told the audience “We consider that Perestroika is a timely and brave step. Youth’s contribution to this revolutionary matter is not by supportive talks but by certain work. Our contribution is our objectives to be fulfilled. Our objectives are: “…following democracy and transparency and contributing to glasnost, … and to support truthful progressive power…for this…These are the objectives of an initiatives’ group. The group should be an organization that works. After the congress I hope we’ll gather and discuss and you’ll participate in this. The organization shall be based on public, voluntary and democratic principles.”
The chairman of the congress stopped Elbegdorj's speech and warned him that Elbegdorj could not say such things. It was 1989 and Mongolia was already a communist country for one generation - 68 years and it was alleged that one out of two people were unofficial spy of communist party Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party (MPRP) that would oppress people who express different opinions than socialism and communism. During the break of the congress, two young people met Elbegdorj and the three agreed to establish democratic movement and to spread the word secretly to young people. The three with other ten later became known as the thirteen leaders of Mongolia's democratic revolution.
At that time, Elbegdorj was a correspondent of army newspaper Ulaan Od and when he came back to work after the youth congress, the word of the chairman of the Young Artists Congress about Elbegdorj's "wrongdoing" at the congress already reached the newspaper. The director of the newspaper warned Elbegdorj that he would fire Elbegdorj if he would participate in any activities out of work and to do anything out of communist and socialist ideological lines. Despite the warning, Elbegdorj and his friends began to secretly meet with other young people in the circle auditorium of the National University of Mongolia and discussed about democracy, free market economy and what they knew about the prohibited subjects of that time and began to draft a plan to organize democratic movement. They met many times and brought new friends and new supporters to join them secretly. One night they put ads of their open demonstration in streets.
On the morning of December 10, 1989, the first open pro-democracy demonstration met in front of the Youth Cultural Center in Ulaanbaatar. There Elbegdorj announced the creation of the Mongolian Democratic Union. Over the next months the activists led by Elbegdorj and others continued to organize demonstrations, rallies, protests and hunger strikes, as well as teacher's and worker's strikes. These were risky acts for the lives of the activists at that time. They met growing support from the population, both in the capital and the countryside and the union’s activities became a wave all over the country.
After many demonstrations of dozens of thousands of people in the capital city as well as provincial centers, eventually MPRP Politburo - the authority of the government gave way to the pressure and entered into negotiations with the leaders of the democratic movement. In February 1990, the chairman of Politburo Jambyn Batmönkh of MPRP’s Central Committee decided to dissolve the Politburo and to resign on March 9, 1990, paving the way for the first multi-party elections in Mongolia. Elbegdorj announced this news to hunger strikers and people gathered on Sukhbaatar square at 10PM on that day after the negotiation between leaders of MPRP and Mongolian Democratic Union. As a result Mongolia became the first democratic country in Central Asia.
As a Member of People’s Congress, Elbegdorj co-drafted and co-adopted on January 13, 1992 Mongolia’s new constitution that guaranteed human rights and democracy. Mongolia became the first democratic country in Central Asia guaranteed by the constitution. An international intellectual refers to Elbegdorj as "Mongolia's Thomas Jefferson. 

Business and media activities
Elbegdorj worked as a correspondent at army newspaper Ulaan Od and a chief of army literature unit between 1988 and 1990. During these positions Elbegdorj wrote articles disclosing and criticizing publicly the brutal characteristics of “year difference” among privates in Mongolian army and wrote articles to fight for soldiers’ health and lives.
Elbegdorj founded Mongolia’s first independent newspaper “Ardchilal” (Democracy) and worked as its Editor-in-Chief in 1990. During his work as the editor-in-chief Elbegdorj spread information on core values of democracy to Mongolian people and advertised that every Mongolian should have all rights and freedom defined the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which resulted in changes to social thinking of Mongolia.
Elbegdorj founded and worked as the head of Mongolia's first Entrepreneurs Association, which helped to privatize livestock free to their herders from the socialist collectives in 1991.
Elbegdorj helped to create Mongolia’s first independent TV station Eagle TV in 1994. It was run by the former Mongolian Broadcasting Company (MBC) (now owned by Eagle Broadcasting Company), a joint-venture between the US Christian missionary organization AMONG Foundation, and the Mongolia Media Corporation (MMC). 

Political career
Elbegdorj was elected to the Parliament four times, in 1990, 1992, 1996 and in 2008. He was involved in the drafting and adoption of Mongolia’s new Constitution, which introduced human rights, democracy and a free market economy to the country. He supported the privatization of lifestock, of state-owned assets, and (unsuccessfully) of land.
While Chairman of the State Commission on Rehabilitation, Elbegdorj initiated and realized the state apology for the victims and families of around 36,000 people. Those had been persecuted or mass massacred during the years of MPRP rule. He played a key role in the approval of the Rehabilitation Law, which provided rehabilitation, compensation to the survivors and families of political victims, and recovery from the Stalinist purges and prohibited future violation of human rights. In addition the law established a Memorial Day for Political Victims.
Elbegdorj, as the head of the Democratic party, co-led the Democratic Union Coalition to its historic victory in the 1996 parliamentary elections. He served as the Majority Leader of the Parliament from 1996 to 2000 and as the Vice Speaker of the Parliament from 1996 to 1998.
He worked as the Prime Minister of Mongolia twice in 1998 and 2004-2006. 

First term as prime minister
In 1998, a clause in the constitution was removed that prohibited members of parliament to take cabinet responsibility. Thus on April 23, 1998 Parliament elected (61-6) Elbegdorj as the Prime Minister. During his term, he made crucial steps in solving the nation’s pressing economic, political, structural and social issues, and firmly continued its open foreign policy. Those are as following: Elbegdorj co-initiated Law on Press Freedom and he played a key role to pass the law in 1998. Based on this law, another law passed that changed all daily state newspapers into public newspapers without direct control and censorship from the government.
Elbegdorj's most significant achievement during his first term as Prime Minister was to collect tax and create tax income. The biggest tax payer and only significant income contributor to the government's budget at the time was the copper ore mining and processing Erdenet Mining Corporation (EMC) - a joint stock company owned by the governments of Mongolia and the Russian Federation. EMC hadn't paid due tax, income and royalty to Mongolia's government between 1997-1998 which resulted in the government financial crumbling.
Because of this, the previous Prime Minister Enkhsaikhan stepped down due to pressure from the opposition party, the MPRP. After becoming Prime Minister, Elbegdorj ordered an audit of EMC. The audit result revealed that the state due income did not enter the state account, instead it went to dubious accounts of directors at the EMC. This corruption related case was reported in detail in investigative series “Swindle of the Century” on Eagle television. Elbegdorj dismissed the EMC's chairman. As a result, the government began to receive due tax, royalty and income from the EMC.
In addition, at the recommendations of international financial institutions such as International Monetary Fund and the World Bank - aid granters to Mongolia, and discount interest rate loan giver Asian Development Bank, Elbegdorj made a decision to sell state owned Reconstruction Bank which became not liquid and experiencing enormous loss, the biggest financial burden to the economy since its establishment in 1997. At that time Golomt bank was the sole private commercial bank in Mongolia and it was the only one that offered to buy Reconstruction Bank.
In response to this and the change of EMC's chairman, the minority group at the Parliament MPRP demanded Elbegdorj to resign and resulted Elbegdorj to lose confidence vote at the Parliament. The Parliament had prevented Elbegdorj's government from selling the bank. Elbegdorj's decision to sell the Reconstruction Bank was proven to be correct. Because the bank bankrupted not long after Elbegdorj's first term as prime minister was over and the bankruptcy led the government to suffer enormous amount of financial loss.
Moreover, Elbegdorj assisted Mongolia's first Wrestling Palace which was half built for a long time to be completely built during his first term as a Prime Minister.
He stayed in office until December 9, because of the disagreements of the Parliament and the President for a new Prime Minister, as the President vetoing proposals from the Democratic Party’s majority. Finally, in December the President agreed to the parliament's proposal on Janlavyn Narantsatsralt, former Mayor of Ulaanbaatar as Prime Minister, and Elbegdorj stepped down. 

Second term as prime minister
On August 20, 2004, Elbegdorj became a Prime Minister of Mongolia for the second time, despite not being a member of parliament. This time he headed a grand coalition government after the vote in the parliamentary elections had been evenly split between the two major political forces - Democratic Coalition and the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party.
In his second term of the government, Elbegdorj proclaimed a fight against corruption and poverty, which he saw as the biggest challenges to Mongolia's economic development.
Besides Elbegdorj initiated a "Green Wall" environmental project to plant trees in barren areas and desert zones to prevent from dust storm coming from Mongolia to Asia and to reduce air pollution.
During his term January 27, 2005, the state controlled National State Television and Radio were converted into formally independent organisations with increasingly smaller control by the government. Also, legal provisions that prohibited demonstrations on Ulaanbaatar's Sükhbaatar Square were abolished. He subsidized and supported technical schools and specialized professions to reduce unemployment. To promote affordable computers and internet access, he established Information and Communication Agency under the government. He[citation needed] attempted to strengthen domestic businesses by reducing the administrative overhead, by eliminating excessive regulations, many licensing requirements, and import taxes for key product categories. By decision of his government English replaced Russian as the first foreign language to be taught in public schools. Elbegdorj initiated the erection of the Genghis Khan memorial complex in front of Mongolia's government house. He also proposed to relocate Mongolia's capital to Harhorin, a small town 400 km west of Ulaanbaatar, at the site of the former (until the 1260s) capital of the Mongol Empire.
In August 2005, Elbegdorj wanted to run for by-elections in Ulaanbaatar's Bayangol düüreg. However, the MPRP threatened to leave the coalition if Elbegdorj ran against MPRP candidate M. Ekhbold, and Elbegdorj withdrew. 
On January 13, 2006, the MPRP left the coalition anyway, and Elbegdorj was forced to resign. The MPRP proceeded to form a new government with the help of DP defectors and independent MPs, the new prime minsiter became M. Enkhbold. The events triggered protests from some civic groups and their followers. 

International relations
During Elbegdorj's term as prime minister, George W. Bush became the first incumbent US president ever to visit Mongolia. His visit was in recognition of Mongolia's contribution to the US-led operations in Iraq.
Also during Elbegdorj's term, Mongolia was accepted into the European Union's GSP+ system, which allows Mongolian exporters to pay lower customs tariffs when exporting to the EU. 

2008 political unrest
Elbegdorj led Democratic Party in the 2008 Parliamentary elections. All of the three level courts – court of primary jurisdiction, appellate and the Supreme Court of Mongolia proved that Mongolia’s General Elections Committee chairman Battulga (MPRP) made decisions violating the Law on Elections that became the major cause of the nationwide elections irregularities that might have changed the elections result by which MPRP won. Civil movement party and Republican party leaders went to MPRP building to give MPRP chairman and Prime Minister Sanjaagiin Bayar a demand to recount the ballots on July 1 after MPRP announced its victory. But Bayar refused to get the paper and the people were not let into MPRP building. People gathered in front of MPRP building demanding MPRP to recount the ballots. MPRP building was protected by the police. The demonstration prolonged and turned into riot and in the midnight President Nambaryn Enkhbayar announced the State of Emergency during which the police shot five civilians to death from their backs and injured many to disability from bullet wounds. A wounded innocent teenager and witnesses confirmed that they were shot by the police. In addition, the police acknowledged its shooting against civilians and usage of rubber bullets in their guns.

2009 Mongolian presidential election
At the Democratic Party convention of April 3, 2009, Elbegdorj was elected as the presidential candidate from the Democratic party. He received 63.5% of the vote, defeating Erdeniin Bat-Üül. After Elbegdorj was announced as the candidate, the Civic Will Party and the Mongolian Green Party pledged their support. Elbegdorj won the elections by 51.21 % of votes while incumbent president Enkhbayar got 47.41 % mostly from the countryside.
On 5 June 2009, the parliament decided to swear Elbegdorj in on 18 June 2009. 

NGO activities
Elbegdorj is a permanent member of the board of directors of the "Young Leader" foundation of Mongolia since 1992 and a member of the director's board of the Mongolian Academy of Political Education since 1993. He founded Mongolia's Liberty Center, a non-governmental organization advocating human rights, freedom of expression and education in 2000.
Elbegdorj is a frequent lecturer, both domestically and abroad. 

Political affiliation
- Member of the National Counseling Committee of Democratic Party from 1994 onwards.
- Leader and chairman of the Democratic Party between April 2006- Sept, 2008 and 1996-1999.
- Chairman of the Democratic Union Coalition of the Mongolian National Democratic Party and Mongolian Social Democratic Party in 1996-2000.
- Leader of the Mongolian Democratic Union in 1989-1997. 

Publications
- Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj Footstep of the Truth Is White, Ulaanbaatar 2000
- Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj The Years of Bearing Weight, Ulaanbaatar 2000
- Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj Mongolia: Moving Mountains, Washington Post, November 21, 2005.
Many other articles, speeches, and interviews by Elbegdorj have been printed in various national and international publications.

Text from Wikipedia
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