Why Mongolia’s Prime Minister Resigned

Oyun-Erdene Luvsannamsrain was elected Mongolia’s Prime Minister in 2021, after gaining prominence by helping to organize mass protests against corruption. Now, after protesters have taken to the streets accusing him of corruption, which he has denied, he’s resigned.

Oyun-Erdene lost a vote of confidence in parliament on Monday, according to a parliamentary statement, failing to secure a majority 64 votes in the 126-seat body. Only 82 lawmakers voted in the secret ballot, which yielded only 44 in approval of Oyun-Erdene.

“It was an honour to serve my country and people in times of difficulties, including pandemics, wars, and tariffs,” Oyun-Erdene said after the vote.

Oyun-Erdene, whose center-left ruling Mongolian People’s Party retained a majority but formed a coalition with opposition parties anyway after legislative elections last year, will remain as caretaker Prime Minister until his successor is appointed within 30 days. 

His resignation, fueled by discontent over his family’s apparent lavish spending and luxurious lifestyle, marks the latest political upheaval in the Asian nation’s longstanding fight against corruption. 

The mineral-rich landlocked country, sandwiched between autocratic giants China and Russia, has been a hotbed of predatory behavior by business elites, while more than a quarter of the country’s 3.5 million population is mired in poverty.

The no-confidence vote means the coalition government will cease to exist, though the Mongolian People’s Party should be able to form a new government.

Oyun-Erdene told TIME in an interview in January that he formed the coalition government to try to overcome Mongolia’s inertia due to politicization. “As a small kid, I looked forward to my country’s development,” he said, “and there have been some projects that people discussed at that time, but still no progress has been made because of political divisions.”

Here’s what to know.

What were the accusations?

This year, antigovernment protests began as early as January. But the Prime Minister faced a new wave of criticism in May stemming from a controversy surrounding his 23-year-old son Temuulen, whom Asia-Pacific commentary outlet The Diplomat reported was recalled from his studies at Harvard University “due to corruption investigations.” Social media reports of Temuulen gifting his now-fiancée luxury items—including, according to CNN, “helicopter rides, an expensive ring, designer handbags and a luxury car”—angered the public.

Protest group Ogtsrokh Amarkhan circulated a petition that got more than 59,000 signatories calling for Oyun-Erden to leave his post, listing his son’s lavish spending as only one of the reasons why. The group also cited inflation and price increases, growing unemployment, and poverty. 

Protesters also called for Oyun-Erdene to release his finances.

How did Oyun-Erdene respond?

Oyun-Erdene’s office has mainly called the allegations of financial impropriety a “smear” and “completely unfounded.” In a statement to CNN, the office said that the Prime Minister “makes regular financial declarations annually in line with Mongolian law.”

Following demands to resign in May, the Prime Minister spoke to local media in defense of his son. Researcher Bolor Lkhaajav reported for The Diplomat that Oyun-Erdene’s son did not ask for financial support from his father and that Mongolia’s Anti-Corruption Agency was looking into the controversy. Oyun-Erdene even reportedly offered to resign without protest if the agency discovered irregularities in his financial statement.

Oyun-Erdene warned before the confidence vote that a change in government could threaten Mongolia’s fragile democracy, which only started in the early 1990s after the Soviet Union collapsed. “If governance becomes unstable, the economic situation deteriorates, and political parties cannot come to consensus. It could lead the public to lose faith in parliamentary rule and potentially put our democratic parliamentary system at risk of collapse,” the Prime Minister said. While defending himself, he acknowledged that he was “dedicating too much time to major projects while paying insufficient attention to social and internal political matters.”

How bad is corruption in Mongolia? 

Mongolia ranks 114 of 180 countries and territories in Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index.

The 2024 Freedom House’s Freedom in the World index describes corruption, particularly involving the mining industry, as “endemic in Mongolia” and said the problem is widely perceived to “have worsened in recent years.” According to Freedom House, the country’s anticorruption laws “are vaguely written and infrequently enforced”, while anticorruption authorities have been “criticized as ineffective in pursuing cases.”

In 2024, U.S. prosecutors sought the forfeiture of former Prime Minister Batbold Sükhbaatar’s two luxury apartments in New York City after they were found to have been purchased using the proceeds of “unlawfully awarded Mongolian mining contracts.” And in 2022, a coal theft case involving minerals being illegally transported across the Chinese border rocked Mongolia, entangling high-ranking officials and business leaders and resulting in an estimated loss of $12 billion to the economy.