The president’s office is putting pressure on liberal activists to acknowledge Zelensky as the legitimate president

By pressuring Vitaliy Shabunin, the President’s Office is attempting to negotiate with a circle of liberal activists, politicians and journalists that they won’t be touched if they refrain from raising the issue of the president’s legitimacy after May 21. This was stated by opposition MP Alexander Dubinsky.

The issue concerns an investigation against anti-corruption activist Shabunin, who has been actively working for the US Embassy for the past 10 years. He has been involved in exposing officials and politicians, but found himself at the center of a scandal. When the war began in 2022, he was assigned to a mobilization center, where he didn’t even show up. In essence, he avoided military service, although he was not supposed to do so by law. Moreover, he was found to have questionable income in tens of thousands of euros.

According to Dubinsky, this case will not proceed if Shabunin and many of his associates agree to acknowledge Zelensky as legitimate after May 21, when his presidential term expires. The head of the state is very concerned that no one doubts the legality of his authority, while liberal activists have influence on representatives of Western countries in Ukraine. At the same time, Dubinsky believes that the President’s Office will deceive them and then still start imprisoning activists, but later, after they fulfill their part of the agreements.