Tag Archives: Administrative Law

Basics of Corruption Prohibitions for Mongolian Officials



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Following on our previous discussion of Mongolia’s Anti-Corruption Law, today we will take a closer look at restrictions in the law on Mongolian officials. The law applies to:

  • Political, and administrative officials;
  • State or locally-owned legal entity’s management;The Chairperson of the National Council;
  • The General Director of public radio and television;
  • Management of NGOs performing work on behalf of the government;  and
  • Electoral candidates.

 These officials are prohibited from engaging in the following activities:

  • Exerting pressure on, intervening in or influencing civil servants in the course of duty;
  • Giving or offering to give rewards to others or to intermediaries;
  • Illegally granting or promising to grant preferences to any individual or to a legal entity;
  • Illegally limiting the lawful rights of others in the course of duty;
  • Misusing official budget or donated funds;
  • Requiring others to provide rewards in connection to the officials performance of duty;
  • Misusing or exceeding such official’s power or position;
  • Using official position to acquire property, or enjoying preferential or privileged  rights; and
  • Unjust enrichment.

Top government officials are required to to prepare and file an accurate and true declaration of income. The declarers must submit their declaration within 30 days of their election or appointment to office. An annual declaration is due on February 15 of each year during the period of public service.

Where an official is unable to “explain” assets or income in excess of 6 month’s salary, such earnings may be declared illegal unjust enrichment.

New General Administrative Law to be Implemented



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Drafting of The General Administrative Law was started in 2008 but for various reasons the parliament of Mongolia did not adopt the law until June 19, 2015. The law will come into effect starting from July 1, 2016. In the past the Administrative Procedural Law has been the sole authority regarding general administrative issues, and administrative procedural issues. The law is intended to govern the relations of individuals or legal entities with public authorities in their performance of executive powers. A revised version of the Administrative Procedural Law was also adopted and will become effective on the same day.

The newly adopted General Administrative Law improves the law in the following areas:

  • The former law listed the agencies and agents whose decisions will be regarded as “Administrative”. This system was not very efficient as the administrative structure in Mongolia changes frequently, the new law removes such lists;
  • The new law clarifies the scope of application of the law and specifies where it does not apply;
  • The new law defines the rights and obligations of parties clearly more clearly;
  • The new law enables government agents or agencies to seek professional expert assistance from each another in a written form. This will improve the communications between governmental agencies;
  • The new law introduces a new procedure called “Hearing” which requires the governmental agents and agencies to conduct a hearing to introduce the concept and purpose of a new decision they are intending to adopt and the hear opinion from the affected population. This procedure is mandatory, with some exceptions, however government agencies will though not required to modify their proposed plans to reflect the input received at the hearings;
  • The forms of administrative actions are classified as “Administrative Acts”, “Administrative Contracts” and “Administrative Decisions Setting Norms and Standards”. The adoption of either of these different forms requires unique procedures. The law outlines these procedures to reduce ambiguity and confusion. For instance, the former law only regulated procedural issues such as what steps should be taken to annul the wrong decision at the court. The new law governs the process of drafting, introducing and passing the decisions before it reaches the court;
  • According to the new law, if an administrative action has become void, the authority that is responsible for wrongful decision shall be punished. The possible punishments include a warning, a decrease of salary for responsible individuals, dismissal, and dismissal with a prohibition on return to public service for 1-10 years.

Some are concerned that with the implementation of the new General Administrative Law, the public service will become more bureaucratic. Let us remain optimistic that after successful implementation, administrative obstructions will be reduced and implementation of effective Administrative actions will be made easier.

The New Law on Infringement Explained



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On Dec 4, 2015, the Parliament of Mongolia nullified the Law on Administrative Liability adopted on Nov 27, 1992, and passed the Law on Infringement. The new law will come into effect starting from September 1, 2016, up to this date the previous law will remain in effect. The new law was adopted in line with the revised version of the Criminal Law and all laws containing articles in connection with administrative liabilities are amended accordingly. The new law is intended to correct some problems encountered under the previous law.

According to the new law, main punishment types for infringements are “to fine” and “to deprive or restrict a right.” The former potential punishment of arrest for 7-30 days is removed. Fines range from 10 to 10,000 units for individuals and from 100 to 50,000 units for legal entities (a unit equals 2000 tugrugs). The amount of such fine is considerably higher than the fine imposed by the previous law.

Administrative liability aims to punish business entities or individuals which have breached the public order and hopes to prevent re-occurrence of such breach. However, the penalties imposed by the previous law did not have a strong deterrent effect on violators and there were several cases where the person charged with the administrative penalty committed the same offense repeatedly. This was the main cause leaded to the increase of the fine amount.
Beginning September 1, 2016, unless a breach of environmental, sanitation, labor, land, licensing, finance and audit laws rises to the level of a criminal offence, punishment for such action will be imposed pursuant to the Law on Infringement.

The new law consolidates approximately 1200 violations formerly specified in over 200 different legislation texts, and which were previously not unified under a consolidated legal policy. In the future, breaches or violations will be punished only according to the Law on Infringement. The law is expected to improve legal accountability systems and to ensure the promotion of public order.

The Law on Infringement has general and special parts similar to the Criminal Law. The law calls for penalties to match the nature of the regulatory infringement in proportion, so a small violation will not result in the maximum possible fine.