Servant of the People

22/04/2019

"Life imitates Art far more than Art imitates Life"

Oscar Wilde (1889)

This is the astonishing situation that has come to pass in Ukraine.

Volodymyr Zelensky is a political novice who is best known for starring in a satirical television series, Servant of the People, in which his character accidentally becomes Ukrainian president. And now, Zelensky has achieved a landslide victory in the country's presidential election. With nearly all ballots counted in the run-off vote, the comedian had taken more than 73% with incumbent Petro Poroshenko trailing far behind on 24%.

It would be easy to dismiss Zelensky as a joke, but this would be a silly thing to do given he is now the President-elect.  Quite what he will achieve in the role is, quite obviously, yet to be seen.  However, he has made statements about removing the immunity currently provided to the president of the country, members of the Verkhovna Rada (the Ukrainian parliament) and judges.  He intends to introduce impeachment laws, to reform the election laws and introduce a process of efficient trial by jury.  This is an element of Zelensky's aim to restore trust in Ukrainian politics.

It's going to be interesting to see what happens.