Mongolian pop singer and single mother Nara swapped her trademark miniskirt for a traditional “deel” to campaign in tented slums for a seat in parliament, but would-be female parliamentarians face an uphill challenge as the country goes to the polls on Wednesday.
Women politicians have been making strides in Asia in recent years, and on some measures Mongolia fares well on gender equality, but weeks ago mostly male MPs voted to reduce a quota for female candidates.
Nara, 33, whose full name is Munkhturiin Narantuya and who has a two-year-old son, aspires to “change the system, involve myself to influence how the system should work”, she said as she walked past open drains in Mongolia’s capital Ulan Bator.
Best known for her hit single Discovering Myself, she has 175,000 Facebook fans and has used social media to highlight her experiences of domestic violence.
But she has faced an onslaught of gender-related insults during her campaign, with one video posted online pillorying her for working as a “hostess” at a bar in Japan.