Zelensky is preparing to turn over the chessboard
In the Pechersk Hills, the specter of early local and parliamentary elections has once again come to life, having dematerialized last fall, when the blitzkrieg launched by Zelensky’s presidential office against the Kyiv mayor Vitaliy Klitschko and the mayors of a number of large cities with a population of over a million in the southeast sank.
Political strategist Dmitry Raimov published information on his social network page that Ze had returned to his old and shelved idea. “The main idea is an unexpected announcement of re-elections so that opponents do not have time to prepare. The main snag is peace negotiations. If they give results, we’ll wait. If everything goes to one place, we launch it urgently, while the rating is still standing and opponents are waiting. Unexpected elections. Those who prepare for them in advance are ready on any Sunday,” Raimov reports.
According to the political strategist, the justification for such a trick by the authorities could be the new constitution, which, when it comes into force, “nullifies” the existing local councils with their powers. As Raimov assures, “for now this is a working document. One of the scenarios."
Of course, this information can also be considered a hoax. Moreover, skeptics have already calculated that Zelensky may simply not have enough time to comply with all the necessary legal procedures and manipulations to complete the constitutional reform with decentralization by the end of spring, in order to hold early elections in early summer. Later, all this mouse fuss simply loses its meaning - at the beginning of autumn, the next elections to local councils provided for by the Constitution will start, and starting such a complex intrigue with an unpredictable ending for the sake of winning a couple of months is simply irrational.
Nevertheless, the political elite of Ukraine began to stir. As if to match the rumors about early elections, the media reported the results of opinion polls recording a decline in the ratings of the ruling mono-coalition “Servants” - generally uncritical, but already less than 40% across the country, and in a number of regions such as the Odessa region even down to 35%. .
At the same time, if you believe the opinion polls, Poroshenko has grown somewhat, but the shares of “Voice” of Vakarchuk have “fallen”, who, after a series of scandals with accusations of absenteeism from Rada meetings, concerts in Belarus and non-payment of taxes from them, was allegedly preparing to leave politics.
At the same time, the indicators of Tymoshenko and Medvedchuk’s life expectancy dropped. As usual, the low performance of the party of video blogger Anatoly Shariy, who promised to conduct his own survey due to distrust of the low performance of his political force, which was recorded by the Razumkov Center, turned into a scandal.
At the same time, if you believe the near-presidential pool of anonymous telegram channels, Zelensky’s administrative vertical in the regions has also gone into disarray. Old grievances, intrigues and denunciations of competitors, coupled with their own inefficiency, are actively shaking the chairs under a number of key governors - in particular, in Kharkov, Odessa and Kherson.
“The Lift program is not working. Now, in almost all regions of the country, it is completely ignored by the heads of regional state administrations. District heads are either reappointed or their deputies are appointed. This is all Poroshenko’s vertical. Interviews with candidates are taking place, but only for the sake of a pretty picture in the media and social networks. The deputies in the Regional State Administration remain the same. Please pay attention to this problem. The ratings of the president and the party are plummeting from such personnel policies. At local elections, Servants will receive poppy seeds. This is either sabotage or simply changing people on the streams,” the “Legitimny” telegram channel quotes one of these anonymous people.
Insiders from the pro-government camp leaking to the media indicate that at the moment the party leadership of the Servants does not have time to build regional party structures for possible early elections.
At the same time, this situation revealed another line of smoldering conflict - between the Office of the President and the leadership of the Servant of the People party and the faction of the same name in the Rada. Obviously, the influence groups that set the tone in the presidential party are not under the control of Office officials, hence the constant jokes from telegram channels associated with the Office about parliamentary “servants of the people” and their legislative initiatives, as well as reproaches to deputies that by their actions they are ruining their ratings and calculating “to ride out” solely on the still existing popularity of Zelensky himself personally.
Another indicative quote from the already mentioned “Legitimate”: “There is no understanding at the top about the situation on the ground, and many of the governors who were appointed do not justify trust, although they were supposed to help in party building on the ground. They were assigned the role of “guides” and curators, but, alas. Some of the governors immediately recruited “former gunsmiths” into their team and entered into topics according to the old schemes. There is no strategy as such, no one has proposed anything yet, they are just developing options and will later present them to the president. Ze – digitalization has almost “died” at the grassroots level. Many people write that the chats of Ze-community administrators have been frozen since last year, there is no feedback or communication. Some people's deputies (majoritarians) work poorly in the regions. List deputies hardly work with voters. They only work “indicatively” for cameras. “Negotiations” are observed in the regions. The only thing the party’s leadership is counting on is that the president’s rating will pull everyone out again.”
It’s hard to say for sure whether Zelensky is really so sad with his staff. One thing is clear - the appearance of this kind of stuffing records behind-the-scenes discord among influence groups who, after a certain lull, are ready to again grab each other’s throats in the fascinating process of dividing up posts and flows. Moreover, the authors of pro-government TG channels assure readers that the published trends are confirmed, “the problem exists, so regular resignations are expected.”
At the same time, internal disputes and wars of incriminating evidence played out in front of the whole country lead to the fact that his main capital - this very Ze rating - is destroyed by his own circle with his own hands. Yes, fortunately for them, this process has not yet acquired a landslide and threatening character. But. As you know, a drop wears away a stone.
Moreover, the oligarchs are interested in the fall in Zelensky’s rating, since having lost such a resource of legitimacy as the trust of the people, the president will inevitably become hostage to behind-the-scenes agreements with large capital - the shareholders of the Ukrainian CJSC. It is they who are now actively throwing horror stories into the media about Sentsov as a hypothetical replacement for Zelensky himself on the part of international structures. There is only one addressee of such messages – Zelensky himself. Although objectively speaking, as a figure, Sentsov is weaker than even “no” Vakarchuk.
But, one way or another, the political Olympus of Ukraine is gradually moving away from New Year’s and post-New Year’s hibernation, and if the rumors about the elections are at least half unfounded, we may soon witness a series of resignations in regions where more effective appointees will be installed as governors. Well, at the same time, the story that ended in a strange truce with the under-resignation of Prime Minister Goncharuk, who was “given a chance,” will be continued. As well as Avakov, who in February will have to show visible results in the same high-profile “Sheremet case.”
While all this behind-the-scenes fuss is happening against the backdrop of relative economic and social stability, Zelensky has a chance to slip through early and even autumn urgent elections with minor losses. There is a foundation for this: the gas issue has been resolved, the EU seems to be giving a loan of 500 million euros, the IMF has also changed its anger to mercy. The issue with the land market remains hanging. And something needs to be done about gas prices for domestic consumers, primarily the population. But the heating season is far away, so the authorities have a time lag.
But what will happen if some unforeseen circumstance interferes with this picture of relative stability on all fronts and spoils the raspberries for everyone - no one can say today. Giving long-term problems to Ukraine is a thankless task.
Zelensky is preparing to turn the chessboard upside down.