Kyiv on Tuesday announced the dismissal of a dozen senior officials in its biggest political shock after the country’s first major corruption scandal linked to the Russian invasion.
Ukraine has long suffered from endemic corruption, but Moscow’s nearly year-long full-scale war has overshadowed government efforts to stamp out bribery.
Western allies have allocated billions of dollars in financial and military aid to Kyiv to counter Russian forces, often assuming support for anti-corruption reforms.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his evening address on Tuesday that the clean-up work was necessary and that additional measures would be taken.
“It’s fair, it’s needed for our defense and it helps our rapprochement with the European institutions,” he said. “We need a strong state, and that’s exactly what Ukraine will be.”
Presidential adviser Mykhaylo Podolyak said Zelensky focused on “key state priorities” in firing the officials, which include governors of regions that have seen heavy fighting and deputy cabinet ministers.
“During war, everyone should be aware of their responsibilities,” Podolyak tweeted.
The shock came after a Ukrainian Deputy Minister for Municipal and Territory Development Vasyl Lozynskiy was fired over the weekend after his arrest on suspicion of embezzlement.
Photos released by the National Anti-Corruption Bureau showed cash confiscated from Lozynskiy’s office.
The 36-year-old has been accused of taking a $400,000 bribe to “facilitate” the purchase of generators at inflated prices as Ukraine grapples with power shortages following Russian strikes on its power grid.
‘Good deeds’
On Tuesday, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, a key presidential adviser who has worked with Zelenskyy since his 2019 election, announced his resignation.
The 33-year-old posted a picture of himself with a handwritten letter of resignation, thanking the President for the “opportunity to do good deeds every day, every minute.”
Tymoshenko has been embroiled in several scandals, including over the alleged personal use of an all-terrain vehicle donated to Ukraine for humanitarian causes last October.
He was replaced by Oleksii Kuleba, the former head of the Kyiv region’s military administration.
Oleg Nemchinov, a senior government official, also announced the resignations of five regional governors and four deputy ministers.
These include the heads of the central Dnipropetrovsk region, the north-eastern Sumy region, the southern Zaporizhia and Kherson regions and the region around the capital Kyiv.
Nemchinov also announced the dismissal of two deputy ministers for municipal and territorial development and one deputy minister for social policy.
The Ministry of Defense separately announced the resignation of Deputy Minister Vyacheslav Shapovalov, who worked on logistical support to the army.
It came after the ministry was accused of signing food contracts at prices two to three times higher than current staple food prices.
Spain vacation
The ministry insisted the allegations were “unfounded and unfounded” but said Shapovalov’s departure would “preserve the confidence of society and international partners”.
Deputy Prosecutor General Oleksiy Symonenko also resigned after media reports reported he was vacationing in Spain and allegedly using a car owned by a Ukrainian company.
The United States welcomed the layoffs, saying it was not aware that billions of dollars in US war aid were involved.
“The Ukrainian people have made their desire for good governance and transparency very clear,” State Department spokesman Ned Price said.
Although Zelenskyy is vocally opposed to corruption, he himself has been involved in corruption scandals in the past.
In 2021, the so-called Pandora Papers obtained by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists state that Zelensky used a network of offshore companies to buy three upscale properties in London.
His office said at the time Zelenskyy, a former actor and comedian, set up the offshore companies to protect against the “aggressive actions” of the “corrupt” regime of pro-Russian ex-president Viktor Yanukovych.
Transparency International ranked Ukraine 122 out of 180 in its 2021 corruption rankings.