Campaigning for Mongolia’s local elections on November 21st officially begins this week. I like to think one of the primary functions of “The Mongolist” is to keep readers on the cutting edge of political phraseology in Mongolia. The run up to the local elections has produced a new phrase to pass along: нүүдлийн шувууд (migratory birds).

In the US political parlance this would be “carpetbaggers.” The term carpetbagger was originally used by Southerners after the American Civil War to refer to Northerners who moved south to take financial or political advantage of the post-war chaos. Today it is used to refer to someone who runs for office in a district in which they have no deep ties or roots. Off the top of my head, Hillary Clinton, a native of Illinois and long time resident of Arkansas and Washington, DC, running for senator in New York in 2000 is a good recent example in US national politics of successful “carpetbagging.”

Similar political maneuvering seems to be afoot in Umnugovi. According to Zuuni Medee and Unuudur Newspapers, 11 out of 33 candidates that the Mongolian People’s Party (MPP) has fielded in the province are currently residents of Ulaanbaatar.1, 2 Each can claim ties to Umnugovi having been born, having family, or otherwise having lived in the province, but all have spent enough time living in Ulaanbaatar in recent years for the “migratory birds” label to have a ring of truth to it.

This is an interesting development at the local level, and I am curious to see if the “migratory birds” label will be used during the campaign by local Democratic Party (DP) and other third-party candidates to paint their MPP opponents as out-of-touch outsiders, even the ones who are not at all “migratory birds.” In my part of the Gobi, which is about 30km (18mi) north of the provincial capital, the DP is the dominate force in local government. The current governor of the aimag and the member of parliament are also DP members. With Tavan Tolgoi and Oyu Tolgoi sitting in the province, it makes perfect strategic sense for any political party to ship in candidates if the local pool is assessed to be too weak to gain control of local government. And, in MPP’s case, a majority in Umnugovi might lessen the sting of the party’s recent setbacks at the national level.

The next two weeks may actually turn out to be exciting to watch. Will the MPP strategy succeed or fail? We’ll know on November 21st. Until then, impress your friends by slipping нүүдлийн шувууд into conversation.

Footnotes
1. Зууны Мэдээ, “Өмнөговь руу нүүдэллэсэн ‘шувууд’-ын хэн нь хэн бэ?”, (October 29, 2012), pg. 3.
2. Өнөөдөр, “Орон нутагт нүүдлийн шувуудын сонгууль болох нь”, (October 25, 2012), pg. A3.