Thursday, November 07, 2019

Recent Ukrainian Presidents

The short list goes like this:

  • 1991-1994 - Leonid Kravchuk
  • 1994-2005 - Leonid Kuchma
  • 2005-2010 - Viktor Yushchenko
  • 2010-2014 - Viktor Yanukovych
  • 2014-2019 - Petro Poroshenko
  • 2019- Volodymyr Zelensky

It gets noteworthy in 2004 starting with Viktor Yushchenko. Yushchenko had been Ukraine's central banker, as well as prime minister, but faced opposition by the coal and gas faction and the oligarchs.  In 2004, as Kuchma's term was ending, Yushchenko announced his candidacy for president as an independent. His major rival was Viktor Yanukovych (remember that name), then prime minister.
Yushchenko got dioxin poisoning at a dinner with a group of senior Ukrainian officials. It didn't kill him, but it did mess him up pretty good. 

Yushchenko lost the first round, that was fraught with, let's say, "irregularities".  After massive protests in Kiev (known as the Orange Revolution), the Supreme Court overturned the election results and ordered a re-vote. Yushchenko won, but Yanukovych was his prime minister until 2007, succeeded by Yulia Tymoshenko .

Yanukovych finally won the presidency in 2010, running against Yulia Tymoshenko.  Now, if you think he looks an awful lot like Paul Manafort, that's hardly a coincidence.  That's when Manafort did his image makeover for Yanukovych. Before that, he was basically a cheap track suit wearing, hairy chested mafia thug, and also the best looking of the bunch.

 


So, keep all that in mind as we go forward.

Yushchenko - pro-EU - poisoned with dioxin.
Yanukovych - pro-Russia - queer-eyed by Paul Manafort.
Poroshenko - "the Chocolate King" - after Yanukovych fled to Russia
Zelensky - the other president Giuliani tried to mess with.



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