Source: English.News.mn                  Date: 07 October, 2010

There are strong rumors that the present head of the State Property Committee (SPC), Mr. D.Sugar, is going to be replaced. No formal charges have been laid out against Mr. Sugar who has said, “Nobody can dismiss me.” However, his confidantes say Mr. Sugar has realized his days are numbered and is preparing the ground for his own nominee, Mr. T.Ganbold, once the Chief of the iron factory in Darkhan, to succeed him. However, the SPC chief has always been a political appointee and the Secretary-General of the MPRP, Mr. U.Khurelsukh, strongly favors the head of the State Property Management and Privatization Board in the SPC, Mr. Kh.Kherlen, to replace his present boss. The final decision will be made by the Prime Minister .

Mr. Sugar is an experienced state official and lawyer, a former MP and also State Secretary of the Ministry of Justice. But not all his actions as Chief of the SPC were taken to be above board. These include the way the SPC under him decided to sell the 131-km railway that had transported uranium from Dornod Mardai, and the way he allowed the Director of Mongolrostsevetmet to give the  Asgat silver mine, worth USD8 billion, to Polymetal of Russia. The sales contract was later canceled by Mr. M.Enkhbold who was Prime Minister then. Mr. Sugar has always maintained that he had nothing to do with the agreement.

Prime Minister Batbold and Mr. Sugar share an agreeable relationship and observers do not think their recent spat over selection of an organization for restructuring the Mongolian Stock Exchange is the reason why Mr. Sugar has fallen out of favor. They rather think that the Government does not believe he is the right man for the job at a time when the contours of the economy are going to be radically redrawn. With many new appointments, such as that of the executive management team for the Development Bank, on the anvil, the Prime Minister and his party possibly want somebody ideologically more flexible and with a pragmatic mindset more akin to theirs.