On April 21, comedian Vladimir Zelensky won the second round of the presidential election in Ukraine, receiving more than 73% of the vote. In this post, he was succeeded by Petro Poroshenko, who ran for a second term, but lost.

Even opponents of the new head of state admit that his election was the main event of the year in Ukraine.

“The choice of Vladimir Zelensky and the triumph of the Servant of the People party is the main political event of the year,” said Petro Poroshenko, a RT source in the European Solidarity party. - Zelensky won the presidential election only because in Ukraine there is a huge request for a change of elites. The Ukrainians entrusted the country to a person without experience, their strong team and with dubious ties with oligarch Igor Kolomoisky. "

First of all, the newly elected president dissolved the Verkhovna Rada. The new parliamentary elections held on July 21 brought Zelensky a stable majority. The Party of the Servant of the People party received the majority of seats, which allowed it to form a government led by 35-year-old Alexei Goncharuk.

The President of Ukraine received a full carte blanche to carry out the reforms announced by him during the election campaign. At the same time, one of his main promises was the establishment of a lasting peace in the Donbass.

Road to peace

Even before the parliamentary elections, the new authorities managed to reanimate direct contacts with the Russian leadership, which practically ceased in the last years of Poroshenko’s presidency.

The first telephone conversations between Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin took place in July. They discussed the settlement of the situation in southeastern Ukraine and "the possibility of continuing contacts in the Norman format."

The “Norman Four” in the person of the leaders of Russia, Ukraine, France and Germany was able to get together only on December 9. Prior to this, the summit was prevented by the actual freezing of Poroshenko's implementation of the Minsk agreements, the implementation of which is the main topic of discussion at the forum.

Under Zelensky, some progress was made in this regard. So, in October, Kiev agreed with the Steinmeier formula, which determines the mechanism for holding elections in the Donbas and introducing the special status of the region. In addition, he managed to carry out the withdrawal of troops in the areas of the settlements Petrovskoye and Zolotoe, despite the active resistance of the Ukrainian radicals.

At the summit, the parties confirmed the lack of alternativeness of the Minsk agreements. It was also announced the preparation of the exchange of held persons on the principle of “all installed on all installed”, which was held on December 29.

In addition, the leaders agreed on the deployment of forces in the Donbass at three additional points until March 2020 and the need to comply with the ceasefire. All participants in the meeting recognized the need to integrate the Steinmeier formula in Ukrainian legislation and agree on the special status of Donbass.

At the same time, at a press conference, Vladimir Zelensky insisted that the transfer of control over the border of Donbass with Russia to Kiev should be carried out before the elections there, although the Minsk agreements indicate the reverse order. However, in the final communique of the summit, this topic was not addressed.

  • Reuters
  • © Ukrainian Presidential Press Service / Handout

Later, Russian President Vladimir Putin noted that the return of control of the border to Kiev could lead to a second Srebrenica.

“The President of Ukraine clearly does not dare to openly oppose the war party,” Mikhail Pogrebinsky, director of the Kiev Center for Political Studies and Conflictology, explained Zelensky’s position to RT. - He shows in every way that he is ready to listen to them, that he is not going to cross any red lines, that he is still the same patriot and nationalist as the whole team. And this creates less and less confidence in what the president can do on the issue of war and peace. ”

Zelensky at a press conference following the summit in the "Norman format" also noted that he would seek to return to Ukraine not only the Donbass, but also the Crimea.

The expert of the Council on Interethnic Relations under the President of the Russian Federation Bogdan Bezpalko believes that such a position leads to the fact that “more and more people both in Ukraine and abroad begin to see in him the successor of the case, Petro Poroshenko in essence, albeit not in form” .

And a week after the summit, the Ukrainian side announced the text of the draft law on decentralization of power in Ukraine proposed by Zelensky. The document does not mention Donbass, and also does not spell out the special status of this region provided for by the Minsk agreements. This draft law has been criticized in the self-proclaimed LPR and DPR.

According to experts, the initiative of the President of Ukraine is an attempt to subjugate local self-government.

“This approach should not be called decentralization, but rather honestly: it is centralization, that is, the introduction of presidential control over the regions,” said Ruslan Bortnik, director of the Ukrainian Institute for Analysis and Policy Management, in an interview with RT.

Word and deed

According to experts of the Ukrainian Institute of Analysis and Management, in November, for the first six months of his presidency, Zelensky fulfilled only 9 of the 55 most important promises made to him during the election campaign.

Among the promises made: the adoption of laws on impeachment of the President of Ukraine and the accusers of corruption, a press marathon and the release of Ukrainian sailors detained during the incident in the Kerch Strait. They returned to Ukraine together with “director” convicted of terrorism Oleg Sentsov in September as part of an exchange of held persons with Russia.

In turn, among those who were released from Ukraine to Russia was the journalist Kirill Vyshinsky, who served as chief editor of the RIA Novosti - Ukraine portal. Later, Moscow handed over to Kiev and the ships detained during last year’s events in the Kerch Strait.

Positive changes have also occurred in the issue of transit of Russian gas through Ukraine. Thus, Gazprom and Naftogaz reached preliminary agreements on the extension of fuel transportation for the next five years. In this regard, from January 1, 2020, mutual judicial claims are nullified. In particular, the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine withdrew the decision to recover $ 7.4 billion from the Russian holding. At the same time, Gazprom agreed to pay about $ 2.9 billion according to the decisions of the Stockholm Arbitration Court. As noted by Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Kozak, it was a choice between "bad and very bad." Meanwhile, Russia and Ukraine are still continuing negotiations on a final gas agreement.

At the same time, an important promise was not realized to reduce utility tariffs for the population. On the contrary, in October, Vladimir Zelensky was forced to admit that due to IMF requirements, tariffs would rise. And last week, the Ukrainian leader even signed a law prohibiting the sale and supply of electric energy imported from Russia. As noted in the Russian Ministry of Energy, such a measure is not aimed at "energy security and reliable energy supply to consumers."

The promise to raise teachers' salaries up to $ 4 thousand per month was recognized unfeasible in the Zelensky team. In addition, the intention was not realized to deprive deputies of the opportunity to engage in “button-press” - to vote instead of other parliamentarians during their absence.

Before the presidential election, Zelensky’s headquarters, skillfully defeating Petro Poroshenko’s slogan “there are many candidates, there is only one president,” said that “there are many candidates, but one of them will certainly go to prison”, alluding to Poroshenko. However, the predecessor of the incumbent president is still at large, although he is called to testify at the State Bureau of Investigation.

As a source in the Fatherland party told RT, Zelensky could not fulfill the promises made to voters.

“His main achievement is the return of Ukrainian prisoners, including Sentsov. But in all other matters, there is still complete failure. Corrupt officials did not go to jail, the war in the east continues, utilities are still expensive, and the population is poor, ”RT said.

Old and new

Although Zelensky promised the country "renewal" in the ranks of managers, in fact, a number of members of his team are associated with the previous leadership. This is the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Arsen Avakov, inherited from Petro Poroshenko, and the new prosecutor general, Ruslan Ryaboshapka, who served as deputy minister of justice in the government of Arseniy Yatsenyuk.

Even Prime Minister Aleksey Goncharuk previously headed the organization “Office of Effective Regulation - BRDO”, created in 2015 by the Minister of Economic Development of the time Poroshenko Aivaras Abromavicius for EU grants. Abromavichus himself under Zelensky headed the state concern Ukroboronprom.

Among the "new faces" that appeared at the Ukrainian political Olympus under Zelensky, there were mainly people associated with the comedian in his previous work. The founder of the 95th quarter humorous studio Ivan Bakanov became the head of the SBU. Another native of the “95th quarter”, a Kaverenshchik from the Krivoy Rog Shpana team, Sergey Shefir, became the first assistant to the president of Ukraine. Another former member of the KVN, Sergey Sivokho, received the post of adviser to the Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine on the issues of reintegration and restoration of Donbass.

Although Zelensky rejected ties with oligarch Igor Kolomoisky, he appointed his former lawyer, Andrei Bogdan, to run the president’s office.

“The president’s team is random people,” says Mikhail Pogrebinsky. - The government is highly unprofessional. It is possible that by spring we will receive other key figures in the Ukrainian government. ”

Large-scale plans

Failure to fulfill old promises, however, did not prevent Zelensky from giving out new ones as president.

So, the president promised to put an end to the “amber” mafia in the western regions of the country, transform the Chernobyl exclusion zone “into one of the growth points for a new Ukraine”, turn the desert lands of the south of the country into fertile, create an amusement park for tourists from Europe, build on the Black Sea coast resort city “from scratch” and even create “Ukrainian Hollywood”.

In August, the Ukrainian leader promised to abolish the moratorium on the sale of farmland, which has been in force since 2001. However, according to opinion polls, about 70% of Ukrainians opposed the initiative. At the same time, Zelensky did not refuse to implement it; in November, the Verkhovna Rada voted for him in the first reading.

Among the priorities of the new leadership of the country is large-scale privatization of state-owned enterprises. They intend to put under the hammer Ukrposhta, enterprises that are now part of the state concern Ukroboronprom, and the energy company Centrenergo. The railways are also partially privatized.

According to Bogdan Bezpalko, Zelensky’s reforms will not be able to significantly increase the well-being of Ukrainians in 2020.

  • Action against lifting a moratorium on the sale of agricultural land in Ukraine
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  • © Gleb Garanich

“In order for this to happen next year, it was necessary to lay the groundwork for this. While these prerequisites do not exist: the war continues, the economy falls, and tariffs rise. Relations with Russia, due to the collapse of which the Ukrainian economy began its rapid decline, are also not being restored, ”the political scientist emphasized.

Questionable Rating

According to experts, unpopular reforms and Zelensky’s inability to fulfill his campaign promises led to a decrease in his rating. According to the Kiev International Institute of Sociology (KIIS), the rating of the president of Ukraine, in September was 73%, in October fell to 66%. Later, KIIS recorded a further decrease in Zelensky's rating to 64% at the beginning of November and 52% at the end of the month.

“Confidence in Zelensky is declining, and even a year has not passed at the new post,” the RT source in the Voice party claims. - He faces very difficult tasks. To improve the living standards of the population, it is necessary to negotiate with Russia and resume the export of Ukrainian products, work to stop the hostilities. But this is difficult to do because of the position of the radicals. I think Zelensky was not ready to solve this level of problems. And every year it will become increasingly difficult for him to rule the country, since he will have to make increasingly unpopular decisions. ”

In turn, the source of RT in the party "Servant of the People" notes that in the new year, the president of Ukraine may face increased opposition from the oligarchy.

“In fact, the majority in the Verkhovna Rada is gone and next year it will be noticeable in the adopted bills. It will be much more difficult for the government to work. Zelensky managed to set against himself all the political parties that would withdraw protests on any occasion. Kolomoisky may also join them. Zelensky gave the IMF guarantees that the oligarch could forget about PrivatBank. The president is waiting for a very difficult year, ”the deputy says.

  • Natural market in Ukraine
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  • © Sergii Kharchenko

According to Mikhail Pogrebinsky, Zelensky’s first six months in power were marked by a “high level of confidence in the president,” although he “didn’t take any serious steps to fulfill his promises” and “seems not going to.”

“The first six months are more likely to puzzle people and prepare for them to become disillusioned with the president and beyond,” the expert summed up.