Zelenskyj has lost support in Ukraine

By NTB - 19 December 2023

Support for President Volodymyr Zelenskyi is falling in Ukraine, and far more people are abandoning the defense chief in the country. This is shown by several opinion polls.

As many as 84 percent of those questioned said in December last year that they had confidence in Zelenskyj, but the proportion has now fallen to 62 percent, according to a poll published in the newspaper The Kyiv Independent.

At the same time, the proportion who answer that they do not trust the president has increased from 5 percent to 18 percent, according to the survey carried out by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS).

Ukraine's defense chief Valery Zaluzhny, on the other hand, enjoys the trust of a whopping 88 percent of those questioned, the survey shows.

Difficult relationship

Zelensky and Zaluzhny have long had a strained relationship, which worsened after the defense chief described the war against Russian forces as deadlocked in an interview with The Ecochief described an interview with Time Magazine that he had good faith in victory in the war.

Ukrainian media have since speculated whether Zelenskyj would fire Zaluzhnyj, but in that case, it would be a very unpopular decision, according to a new opinion poll published by KIIS on Wednesday.

Only 2 percent of those questioned say they would support such a decision, while 72 percent say they would look negatively on a possible removal of the chief of defense.

Zelensky has been careful not to criticize Zaluzhny directly and denied at a press conference on Tuesday that there is a conflict between the two.

However, the Ukrainian president did not give the defense chief his full support but called for concrete results from the country's military leadership.