Mongolia's 2024 parliamentary elections were well run, although their competitiveness was undermined by an uneven playing field caused by campaign restrictions and biased media coverage favouring the ruling party. The short campaign period, combined with government-promoted salary and benefit increases, provided the ruling party with an undue advantage, blurring the line between party and state. Allegations of pressure on civil servants further raised concerns about the freedom of voters to make their own choices. Despite these challenges, the election administration operated professionally and implemented a comprehensive voter information programme.
These are some of the main conclusions from the final report on the June 2024 elections published by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) .
The report offers 24 recommendations to bring elections further in line with OSCE commitments and other international obligations and standards for democratic elections.
Key recommendations include:
- Developing clear procedures for manual vote counting and addressing any discrepancies between electronic and manual counts
- Removing voting restrictions based on intellectual disability and revising the blanket deprivation of voting rights for prisoners
- Prohibiting misuse of public resources and pressure on public employees, and providing for a clear separation between official duties and campaigning
- Strengthening campaign finance regulations and setting up mechanisms to address violations
- Annulling criminal provisions on false information and disproportionate sanctions for libel in order to safeguard freedom of expression
- Amending laws to align deadlines for resolving electoral disputes with the election calendar
- Resolving disputes over election results promptly before results are submitted to the parliament or elected members are sworn in
ODIHR deployed an Election Observation Mission on 21 May 2024, which remained in the country until 9 July.
All 57 participating States across the OSCE region have formally committed to follow up promptly on ODIHR's election assessments and recommendations. A list of previous ODIHR recommendations and the extent to which they have been implemented so far can be found on p.27 of today's report. The ODIHR Electoral Recommendations Database tracks the implementation of recommendations across the entire OSCE region.
