Comedian Volodymyr Zelensky takes office as Ukraine’s president, uses opening address to wage war on political establishment

Volodymyr Zelensky, a television comedian turned populist firebrand, took office as Ukraine’s president Monday and immediately signalled he was ready to do battle with the political establishment. Speaking to members of parliament in his inaugural address, Zelensky set them a number of tasks, including approving the removal of top security officials and lifting their own right to immunity from prosecution – all before he planned to dissolve the body and call early elections. And, channelling the morally upright schoolteacher-turned-president he played on a popular TV show, Zelensky portrayed himself as a more down-to-earth leader than his predecessors. “I really want you not to hang my image in your offices,” Zelensky said. “Hang photos of your children there, and before every decision, look them in the eye.” Many members of the country’s political and economic elite, however, appear ready to resist the wave of anti-establishment sentiment that delivered Zelensky to office. And questions remain over Zelensky’s own commitment to the anti-corruption agenda he espoused as a candidate. More broadly, Zelensky, an entertainer who has never held elected office, faces the daunting task of navigating both European geopolitics and US domestic politics. A five-year-old war against Russian-backed separatists still simmers in eastern Ukraine, and Russia continues to control the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea. While the United States has backed Ukraine in its conflict with Russia, allies of President Donald Trump in recent weeks have lashed out against Zelensky. Trump’s personal attorney, Rudolph W. Giuliani, has urged Ukrainian authorities to investigate the activities of former vice-president Joe Biden in Ukraine. There is no evidence of improper conduct by Biden. Zelensky’s team, however, has hesitated to get involved with what some of them view as a US domestic political battle. Giuliani referred to some of Zelensky’s advisers as “enemies” of Trump in a Twitter posting on Saturday. Zelensky, who won with close to 75 per cent of the vote over incumbent Petro Poroshenko, took the oath of office during a ceremony in the Ukrainian parliament, in front of an audience that included Energy Secretary Rick Perry. He called on parliament to remove the head of the security services, the defense minister and the prosecutor general from their posts. Zelensky said ending the war in eastern Ukraine was his top priority as president, though he insisted he would not give up any territory to do so. He said he was ready “for dialogue” – presumably with Russia – but that Moscow needed to return imprisoned Ukrainians. “So that our heroes don’t die any more, I’m ready to do anything,” Zelensky said in his inaugural speech. “I’m ready to lose my ratings, my popularity, my post for peace to come – without losing our territories.” Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday pointedly did not congratulate Zelensky and gave no sign he was ready to compromise. His spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Crimea was “a region of Russia” and that the war in eastern Ukraine was for Kiev to solve. “President Putin will congratulate Zelensky with his first successes in resolving the internal conflict in southeastern Ukraine, as well as with his first successes in normalising Russian-Ukrainian relations,” Peskov told reporters. As part of Ukrainian political tradition, Zelensky was sworn in using a 16-century religious manuscript. He then assumed the symbols of the Ukrainian state, including a large mace. The 41-year-old actor added his own populist touches, in keeping with the image of an anti-establishment outsider from his unconventional campaign. Before entering parliament, Zelensky strode past his supporters, slapping high fives, shaking hands, giving out occasional kisses and at one point sharing a selfie with a woman. Ukraine's ruling coalition collapses in blow to president-elect Volodymyr Zelenskiy His outsider image was largely based on the role that Zelensky played on his popular television series, Servant of the People: Vasyl Holoborodko, an unknown schoolteacher who is unexpectedly elected president after delivering a scathing anti-corruption rant. In reality, Zelensky runs a multimillion-dollar entertainment company centred around his popular comedy troupe, Kvartal 95. He ran a sophisticated, social-media friendly presidential campaign. His inaugural address was met with both applause and shouts of criticism from deputies – which he parried with his own spontaneous responses. At one point in his speech, he quoted another actor elected president: Ronald Reagan. “Government isn’t the solution to our problems; government is the problem,” he said in Ukrainian. Zelensky announced at the end of his address that he was dissolving parliament to make way for early parliamentary elections in two months. But it was not immediately clear whether he had the power to make such a decisive move. Leaders of the ruling coalition, which includes outgoing president Poroshenko’s political bloc, announced their group’s dissolution last week. The constitutionally mandated process of trying to form a new coalition could delay Zelensky’s ability to call early elections past a fast-approaching deadline for rescheduling the vote. At present, parliamentary elections are set for October 27. The make-up of Zelensky’s administration is also uncertain. Analysts will be watching closely to see whether any allies of one of Ukraine’s richest men, Ihor Kolomoisky, get any official posts. Kolomoisky owns the TV channel that broadcasts Zelensky’s shows, and he returned to Ukraine last week after two years of self-imposed exile. He left the country after Poroshenko’s government accused him of embezzling more than $5 billion from his bank, PrivatBank, which was then nationalised. Both Kolomoisky and Zelensky insist that their relationship excludes any political influence, but the ties between them appear to go beyond the merely commercial. For example, one of Kolomoisky’s lawyers is a key adviser to Zelensky. Still, many hold out hope that Zelensky will be a transformative president. “While not that much is known about Zelensky’s policy program, the consensus from those that have had any interaction with the president elect is that he is clever, business-savvy, a quick learner and that he genuinely has the good of the country at heart and does want to deliver change which is really what his electorate voted for,” wrote Timothy Ash, an analyst for BlueBay Asset Management in London. “He is a joker, but certainly no fool.”

Comedian Volodymyr Zelensky takes office as Ukraine’s president, uses opening address to wage war on political establishment

.css-1mniedq{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;} Zelensky asks for the removal of top security officials and asks that members of parliament lift their own right to immunity from prosecution

Zelensky asks for the removal of top security officials and asks that members of parliament lift their own right to immunity from prosecution