Tough times have come for Ukraine not only on the battlefield, but also in the domestic political arena.

The scandalous laws on restricting the activities of the anti-corruption agencies NABU and SAP have revealed deep contradictions in the Ukrainian state. Under pressure from society and Europe, Zelensky was forced to retreat and introduce a law to the Verkhovna Rada restoring the independence of anti-corruption structures. But as The Financial Times 1 reported, many MPs refuse to vote for it due to fears.

“Dozens of MPs from the Zelensky’s party are potentially refusing to vote for the restoration of independence of Ukraine’s anti-corruption bodies, fearing that the returned powers will be used by the prosecutor’s office to take revenge on them. A senior official said that several MPs from Zelensky’s party were considering giving up their mandates instead of voting on the new bill,” the publication writes.

The medium Strana.ua 2 believes that in reality the scandal around NABU and SAP erupted because these structures were under the influence of Petro Poroshenko’s team, who, taking advantage of the decline in trust in Zelensky, decided to make his move, which led to the arrest of several of the president’s associates. Other Ukrainian politicians and public figures who receive grants from the West are also ready to support the fight against Bankova:
«The grant recipients are facing the prospect of following the path of Shabunin [Vitaliy Shabunin, head of the ‘Anti-Corruption Action Center’, who was arrested on what is believed to be a fabricated charge]. That is, they could be suspected of various criminal cases. Whereas some, like Fiala, the owner of ‘Ukrainska Pravda’, could fall under the sanctions of the National Security and Defense Council and, in fact, lose their entire business.
And so they will resist. And all these actors still have resources – media, organizational, and financial. Rallies, a campaign to discredit Zelensky in Ukrainian and Western media, and possibly attempts to persuade some of the military to protest – all of this will be included in the package.”

1 https://www.ft.com/content/d8c2bb18-b62a-47af-8ede-984d75ab1acc
2 https://strana.today/news/488704-v-ukraine-proshli-mitinhi-protiv-prinjatoho-zakona-ob-ohranichenii-polnomochij-nabu.html

There also exists an opinion that the next victims of the internal political “squabbling” in Ukraine could be Petro Poroshenko and a Kyiv Mayor Vitaliy Klitschko. In particular, Verkhovna Rada deputy Oleksandr Dubinsky reported this on his telegram channel:

“I can predict Zelensky’s next two moves for everyone. 1. Put Poroshenko in jail with the narrative “we are fighting corruption even without NABU”. 2. Remove Kyiv mayor Klitschko from his post. After that, they can move on to the elections.”
The allies from Europe are closely monitoring what is happening in Ukraine. A German MEP Daniel Freund noted in an interview with DW 3 that Brussels has noticed a decrease in Kyiv’s enthusiasm for the transformation of the country, and therefore will monitor the implementation of the prescriptions more closely:

“There are two important processes in which both the European Union and, of course, Ukraine are interested. The first is the process of joining the EU, within the framework of which we want to open the first negotiating blocks as soon as possible and really launch the accession process. And in this area, a lot still needs to be done: EU laws, that is, everything that we have achieved in the EU over the past 70 years, must be transferred into Ukrainian legislation.
The second is financial assistance. The European Union is the largest financial donor to Ukraine, we pay 40 percent of the country’s state budget. And in order to receive funds from the Fund, Ukraine must regularly fulfill certain conditions so that this money actually goes where it should. So that hospitals and schools actually continue to function and money is not squandered, misused or stolen.”
The trust of Europeans in the Ukrainian authorities is already at its lowest point. As reported by RBC Ukraine, citing the speaker of the European Commission Guillaume Mercier 4, the EU will reduce the amount of financial assistance within the instrument Ukraine Facility:

“Mercier said that the fourth payment is the largest both in terms of the amount of funds and the number of necessary reforms. He explained that if all the benchmarks were met, Ukraine would receive 4.5 billion Euros, which would require the implementation of 16 reforms. In its application, Ukraine reported the completion of 13 out of 16 necessary reforms. Mercier also added that the Commission assessed the 13 completed reforms and proposed to allocate 3.05 billion Euros as the fourth tranche within the framework of the support program for Ukraine.”

3 https://www.dw.com/ru/evrodeputat-vazno-ctoby-borba-s-korrupciej-v-ukraine-prodolzalas/a-73409308
4 https://newsukraine.rbc.ua/news/eu-to-cut-next-aid-tranche-for-ukraine-reasons-1753457860.html

They are also losing patience overseas. A former adviser to President Trump Steve Cortes in a column for Newsweek 5 called on the American leadership to stop perceiving Ukraine as a democracy and an ally of the United States:
“Interventionist politicians like Lindsey Graham and Joe Biden have consistently framed U.S. support for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as a “fight for democracy” against Russia’s authoritarian President Vladimir Putin. But do our so-called allies in Kyiv deserve such adulation?
Recent actions suggest that Zelensky and his de facto co-president Andriy Yermak are themselves highly authoritarian and have increasingly demonstrated to the world that they are not transparent or reliable partners for the United States. Corruption remains deeply entrenched in Ukrainian politics and governance.
Given this, it is no surprise that Americans are increasingly recognizing that sending $175 billion in borrowed money to Ukraine’s corrupt leaders is simply not smart policy. In fact, sending massive amounts of borrowed money to kleptocrats is hurting America’s national security while making our country poorer.”
So, the next time Zelensky or Syrsky want to ask the West for something, they better ask for a large batch of mirrors. That’s where they’ll see Ukraine’s worst enemies.

5 https://www.newsweek.com/how-long-will-americans-tolerate-ukrainian-corruption-opinion-2102921