Enkhbayar - Political Career

Political Career

Enkhbayar entered politics in 1990 and became part of the new political order immediately. He served as a vice chair of the government’s arts committee for the first two years of democratic rule. In 1992, he was elected to the State Great Khural (Mongolian Parliament) as a member of the MPRP. Somewhat unusual for a former Soviet satellite state, Mongolia voted to retain the MPRP during its first venture into democratic elections, and Enkhbayar was appointed to serve as the country's Minister of Culture. He held that post until 1996, when the Mongolian National Democratic Party ousted the MPRP in elections that year. In 1997, Enkhbayar was elected to lead the MPRP. In 1999, the country was hit by one of its infamous zud spells, when summer draught and cold weather blizzards resulted in severe food shortages and loss of thousands of livestock. The current government had responded poorly to the disaster and the MPRP received an unexpected boost from the climatological disaster. Enkhbayar held onto his seat in the Mongolian parliament, where he held the title of minority leader, and shepherded the party through a triumphant return to the office in 2000, in a landslide election, winning 72 out of 76 seats. Under his leadership, MPRP became a member of the Socialist International, an international Institution of 162 political parties and organisations from all continents.

With the MPRP in control of the Great Hural once again, Enkhbayar became the country's Prime Minister. He embarked on an ambitious plan to improve the infrastructure and encourage foreign direct investment. These included the new Millennium Road, the first to traverse Mongolia's 600,000 square-mile territory from east to west, and an agreement with a Canadian group to begin gold mining. The economy had revived through these reforms with GDP increasing by 4% in 2002, and reaching 10% growth rate in 2004. In 2004, MPRP lost to Motherland Democratic Coalition, a new political entity. Enkhbayar, retained his seat, and took up the post as the Speaker of the Parliament for one year. He entered the race for president in the spring of 2005, and campaigned by helicopter to cover the sparsely populated country, where even permanent settlements are often spaced miles away from one another. Later that year, he welcomed U.S. President George W. Bush for an official visit. It was the first time an U.S president visit the country in the history of Mongolia. President Bush's visit was a response to Enkhbayar's support and deployment of soldiers to Iraq.

Under Enkhbayar’s service, Mongolia has won international respect for its peaceful transition to democracy in the post-Cold War era, and the continuance of multi-party elections despite occasional crises. In an attempt to expand this transition model, Enkhbayar had tried to forge diplomatic ties with communist North Korea, the world’s most economically, and politically isolated country. "Being democratic makes you more stable and makes you more … protected," Enkhbayar explained to Washington Times writer Bill Gertz. "You feel safer when you are a democracy because you see other countries in the region, North Koreans for example, are not safer, although they are trying to keep their old regime as long as possible. So we think that democracy means a safer security."

During his exceptional career, Enkhbayar implemented many initiatives, which substantially improved the social and economic conditions in Mongolia. One of Enkhbayar’s first initiatives, when he became the Prime Minister in 2000, was to bring the Millennium Challenge Compact (MCC) to Mongolia. After years of lobbying the US Government, he managed to qualify Mongolia for the US$ 285 million aid in 2007. His other achievements include the record debt forgiveness he negotiated with the Russian Government. In 2004, Russia wrote off 97% of its Soviet-era loans to Mongolia, which it was estimated to amount to US$ 11.3 billion. This was the first time since 1920s that Mongolia did not owe debt to its northern neighbour.