The line is part of a 50 billion tugrik ($13.9 million) programme in the amendment called "A school close to home is the best school", ikon.mn reported on Thursday: 14 billion to rent premises for schools in housing estates, 15 billion for their desks and equipment, 18 billion for equipment at specialised senior schools, and 2.5 billion added to private schools' variable costs. The programme promises 9,900 new places in 22 buildings.
Member of parliament O. Saranchuluu said the amendment takes 3.5 billion of the 18 billion for the Ikh Zasag King school. To ubn.mn Saranchuluu put a second name beside it: "3.5 billion for the Ikh Zasag King school and 3.6 billion for the Erdem Nova school were included. Of the six schools chosen, two are these."
The school connected to my family has made no request. There is no such evidence.
The education ministry's state secretary, T. Nyam-Ochir, took questions after the petitions committee sat earlier in the week. Ikh Zasag, Shine Sanaa and Imperial were among the schools that had applied, the state secretary said; from 1 September the ministry works with one school, Erdem Nova, on a specialised senior school under its own management, 5 or 6 more applications had arrived without a contract, and only variable costs are on the table for such schools.
The prime minister answered on Thursday. "The school connected to my family has made no request. There is no such evidence. A prime minister would not do such a senseless thing. The education ministry should speak openly about its own financing," Uchral said, as ikon.mn quoted him.
Finance minister Z. Mendsaikhan said the 50 billion was entered for the programme and that no budget was allocated to a school connected to the prime minister, ubn.mn reported. To ikon.mn the minister said the ministry had no information on the matter. The education ministry has not published which schools would receive the 18 billion.
The amendment is the single item of the extraordinary session that runs to 14 September. Its known lines came from the ministers themselves: a pension of 1.1 million tugrik for 450,000 pensioners from 1 November, paid from a 1.5 trillion tugrik dividend the state takes from Erdenes Tavan Tolgoi, and a deficit the Audit Office put at 2.048 trillion, 2% of GDP. The first reading ran into Monday night. The standing committees have been working through the text since.
Neither outlet spells out the connection between the school and the prime minister's family beyond his own phrase, and the desk has not established who owns Ikh Zasag King. On the record so far: a sum, and a list that has not been published.