– Difficult in a democracy

At Easter there should have been elections in Ukraine, but it has been postponed indefinitely due to the war.

At the same time, President Zelenskyy is becoming more and more powerful.

Ukraine’s former president Petro Poroshenko accuses President Zelenskyi and his close associates of having too much power.

– Parliament is unable to work, because it has lost its functions, which it has according to the constitution. Who took them? It’s the president’s office. The elected representatives are no longer parliamentarians, Poroshenko told the Ukrainian television channel Espreso.tv.

Boxing legend Volodymyr Klitschko, brother and adviser to Kyiv’s mayor with the first name Vitalij, has also criticized the president:

– If you can replace the chief of defense in wartime, then you can probably do the same with the president, right, he said in an interview with German Focus.

– We live in one state of emergencyA state of exception is a legal state in which ordinary laws are temporarily suspended. (snl.no), everything is controlled from a central point; the courts, the police, the media. But we are still a democracy, stated the former hard-hitting boxer.

His brother, the mayor of Kyiv, said much the same thing in Der Spiegel before Christmas. He spoke of Ukraine becoming more authoritarian.

Criticism also comes because journalists – based on the state of emergency – are not allowed to be present at meetings in parliament. Therefore, the public does not necessarily get to know about everything that happens in Ukrainian politics.

Yevgeniy Golovchenko at the Department of Political Science at the University of Copenhagen explains to VG:

– There is a military state of emergency in Ukraine, which means that some democratic processes, such as elections, have been put on hold partly by the democratic constitution itself, and other legislation.

– Explain!

– It is both illegal to hold elections during a state of military emergency, but also practically difficult to ensure free and equal access to elections during hostilities, occupation of parts of the country, massive flows of refugees out of the country, as well as internally displaced persons. The idea behind these restrictions is to create a mechanism that can defend democracy in the long term.

Yevgeniy Golovchenko continues:

– Even before the full-scale invasion, Zelenskyj was criticized by his opponents for centralizing power around him, a criticism that has also previously been leveled at presidents in Ukraine. This has of course continued.

Little big Volodymyr Zelenskyy achieved extreme popularity in 2022 for the way he led Ukraine, not only abroad, but also among Ukrainians. Confidence in Zelenskyj was sky high immediately after the invasion in February 2022. At the time it was at 90 percent. Now, according to the polling institute KIIS, it is around 60 per cent.

– What do you think about the fact that confidence in Zelenskyj is falling?

– Confidence in Zelenskyj has fallen slowly since spring 2022, according to KIIS. But it is still significantly higher than it was before the Russians launched a full-scale invasion.

– The fall must be seen in light of the fact that confidence in Zelenskyj grew exceptionally quickly to a sky-high level at the beginning of the full-scale invasion. It would be very difficult to maintain such a high level of trust in a democracy for a very long time. It is both an opposition and citizens who have the opportunity to criticize the president.

– So it’s not so unexpected?

– In other words, the gradual fall in trust in the president is part of a relatively normal process. The enormous growth in trust in 2022 was partly due to Ukrainians rallying against the Russians. The phenomenon occurs in several places in the world in extreme crisis situations. Very often, such increases are relatively short-lived. In the case of Ukraine, the state of crisis is becoming a new normality and the domestic political debate is gradually returning, says Yevgeniy Golovchenko.